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hecohansen31 · 4 years ago

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Secrets Whispered

Michael Langdon x Secretive! Reader

(A/N): Hello there, lovelies!

Long time no see, right?

I just thought about this idea, since @guiltyfiend (also please do let me know, when you know what you prefer what you’d like as your ko-fi reward!) made me an amazing ship based about this concept and I just couldn’t wait to do something about it.

I am also personally, maybe (since I don’t feel apprecciated in the other fandoms I am in) of making a few comebacks in this fandom, if any of you would like iit obviously!

So, please, if you want more, don’t forget to leave some kind of feedback I truly apprecciate it from the bottom of my heart and it’ll truly make my heart beat stronger and my fingers write faster!

Don’t ever ever forget to support your beloved writers with feedback, if you liked what they wrote!

Have a nice reading!

SUMMARY: Michael is immediately fascinated by you as there are just too many mysteries around you.

WORDS: 2,9 K

WARNINGS: Mention of Trauma, Mention of The End of The World, Apocalypse-Antichrist and all that stuff, Also I am just extremely rusty about writing Michael, so please do bear with me if this sucks...

Michael had noticed immediately how you stood out of everyone else in the Outpost he had been ‘examining’.

It wasn’t some kind of ‘cheery and flashy standing out’, like many of the women and men that threw themselves at his feet or thought to impress him with a few sassy words that would get them instead on his nerves.

No, you simply stood out, because you didn’t try anything to impress him.

And no one in the Outpost seemed to truly know you.

Which was very strange for a group of people that had passed six months with only the company of each other in a closed off place, but whenever he’d question people about their relationships with you, he’d receive always the same answer.

They didn’t know nothing more than him.

You weren’t certainly shy, since you liked chattering with others next to the fireplace, but there was some mindless rhythm to the conversation that made it particularly difficult for him to discover much about you, since he couldn’t help but feel like you used soft and polite words as a shield.

So, he couldn’t lie when he admitted to you that he had been looking forward to the interview.

Your eyes had ducked immediately down to your hands, a slight blush on your cheeks, but he knew that you weren’t simply faking modesty.

In all truth what you were doing was simply hiding your reaction to him.

To avoid giving yourself away.

He had known back then that it would be quite the power struggle with you and when he had started questioning you, all he had gotten were curt but short answers.

‘Is your name…?’ ‘Yes’.

‘… and your parents are…’ ‘Yes’.

‘… before the whole Apocalypse, you worked at a local library, didn’t you?’ ‘It was actually a bookshop, sir’.

And it was almost unnerving, hadn’t Michael, as always felt, like there was some thrilling challenge in your words and secretive demeanor, but his haughty tone had quickly shifted, when an answer of yours had surprised him.

‘Why, Mrs. (L/N), should you be chosen for the Sanctuary’ he had asked, hoping it would get him some kind of reaction from you, and it had.

Your head had finally pushed itself up to meet his eyes, immediately latching themselves onto Michael’s light blue.

‘… I don’t think that I even want to go to the Sanctuary, sir’ there was some kind of innocence in your reply that would have sounded arrogant from anybody else, hadn’t it been, like in your case, the utter truth ‘… for me it isn’t a question of deserving it, sir’.

The added words had certainly meant to somehow soothe the veiled insult the previous ones had uttered behind themselves.

‘Why do you think such an unconventional thing, little dove?’ the nickname this time got an honest shade of red placing itself on your cheek ‘… must I remind you that one of the few rules I’d like all the residents to follow is to be sincere to the core?’.

But he knew you weren’t lying.

And yet, it would have been easier if you had.

Although he strangely didn’t want this to be easier, because he liked complicated people, even more in a situation like this one, one in which everybody seemed so dull in the face of the end of the world.

But you were anything but dull underneath that defied appearance.

‘I am sincere’ there was fire in what you said, like it thoroughly burned in your heart.

Like you believed it wholeheartedly.

And Michael liked that.

‘… I just…’ now slowly something intimate and personal was coming on your face ‘… if this world had come to an end, is it natural that we continue on living on borrowed time?’.

There was such a longing ache in your words, as if you knew that they were true and yet you hadn’t ever had the courage to utter them, because they would have sounded foolish.

And they would have to anybody but Michael.

He also lived on borrowed time.

‘Humans ache for survival’ he commented, loving the contrast that your eyes made at hearing those words ‘… in any way or shape. It’s a natural instinct’.

‘And yet survival isn’t living’ you spoke softly, your head slowly turning away to look around yourself, as if you had again to hide your true self and Michael couldn’t help but be almost wounded by the move that meant a backward step in your journey.

He had been interested when this conversation had started with you, but now he was… almost enamored with what you had said.

What you hid so attentively, guarding it as a dragon would do with his own treasure.

‘It isn’t the same thing, you are right’ the low tone of his voice was enough to regain your attention ‘… but isn’t surviving better than staying outside where the toxic air would kill you, in a few minutes?’.

And now sadness crept on your face, alongside tiredness, as if you already knew what would be happening, next.

What Michael would have said.

And you were tired of it.

And it was enough to get your blood boiling, in a wonderful reaction in front of Michael’s eyes, happy to have gotten under your skin, but what you said hit him deep inside.

‘I must seem selfish for thinking this way…’ your voice was low, but it had an edge to it that brought, this time, Michael to focus his attention on you ‘… but I never asked to be saved, some people just stormed in my house, because they said I had some kind of special blood… and they… they took me, meanwhile my whole family died’.

He would have laughed in the face of everyone, had they said something similar, because he knew that it was all a show to convince him.

But you thought that truly.

‘There are millions of people better than me, and I got fucking lucky to be the only one to be here, alone and useless…’ now you were through your own ‘delirium’ and although Michael had been desperately looking to dig in your own soul, he felt like he had just hit a moment that was too private.

Maybe a bit too much.

‘… I am not the one you want to bring to the Sanctuary. If the world has come to an end, it must mean something’.

That Michael’s plan had worked.

But he almost felt guilty for it.

‘… I am sorry’ the words were now quiet, as the others you had uttered echoed deeply in the walls of his small private quarters ‘… it must… I must have misspoken myself’.

‘Oh no no’ his tone was rushed and although he knew that he was showing her something that he had always kept inside of himself, treasuring them attentively ‘… had all the interviews been as interesting as yours, Mrs. (Y/N)’.

Strangely the words weren’t of any comfort to you, although Michael accompanied it with a soft smirk on it, definitely less devious than the one he had for other people.

But he guessed he must have still looked like a wolf clothed in sheep clothes.

‘… is this over?’.

Whatever he had gained through the interview had somehow been completely dispersed, now and you looked like you desperately wanted to go away, somehow, probably because whatever mask had been held in place was now shattered on the ground.

‘Yes, it is’ and he hadn’t ever seen somebody raise that fast with a full set of petticoats ‘… but, I’d like to talk to you, more, Mrs. (Y/N)’.

A bitter smile was now on your face.

‘There are better people in here’ you spoke, and he detected finally something that you had hidden for so long: insecurity.

And as much as he wanted to desperately use it against you: he couldn’t bring himself to.

‘… more deserving of the Sanctuary’.

‘I’ll take that into consideration, if you don’t have any other suggestion for me on how to do my job’.

‘Again, my mouth speaks words that I don’t truly mean…’.

It was almost adorable the way you rushed to apologize.

But there was no fear in your eyes.

It was a first.

‘… I was joking’.

A breath of relief still escaped your lips, and as soon as it had appeared it was now gone.

‘I didn’t think that the devil could joke’.

And your last words effectively knocked the air out of his lungs.

Michael knew for sure that you had been avoiding him, probably uncomfortable with what you had shared with him.

Or better what he had forced you to share.

You’d leave supper early, as soon as he joined it and you’d rush your step whenever you met him in the corridors.

And it was such a shame, since he wanted to get to know you better.

So, he had planned like some kind of idiotic male a small strategy to meet you alone in the library, that afternoon, stalking attentively every step of your day, soon realizing that you visited the enormous local at least once a day, after lunch so that you could unwind and another time after dinner, setting up the book that your fellow housemates had left everywhere in the room.

You had an order of your own and you respected it almost maniacally.

A routine of some kind and Michael took advantage of it, catching you as you were completely taken by a reddish volume in your hands a pile of half-forgotten books adjusted beside you, as if you had suddenly been taken by the impulse to search through the pages of the book.

He wondered whether they had asked for you and you hadn’t been able to deny the claim of the paper.

‘… interesting reading?’ he had startled you, and you had immediately closed the book, almost risking to hit your nose, meanwhile Michael wasn’t able to stop a laugh from leaving his mouth and you lowered your head to hid an embarrassed annoyance on your elegant face.

He had carved its traits in his pillow as he dreamt, a tormented dream of you standing right on the pillow next to him, staring at him longingly but resistance always matched it, in your eyes.

‘… definitely is’ you commented, meanwhile you turned the book so that he could look at his title, the defiance in your gestures didn’t have to speak loudly for it to be fully understood ‘… ‘The Scarlet Letter’ by Nathaniel Hawthorne, have you ever read it?’.

Michael had been a child when books had entered his life in silly fairy tales that his grandmother and then his ‘adoptive mother’ had started telling him, as they slowly got darker by the time grew into the figure he had been shaped in since childhood.

But as he had grown up, he had swiftly forgotten the pleasure of reading, different things occupying his mind and he hadn’t ever had a break to properly catch up with human literature, alongside.

And because of that and much more, he had to admit it that the passion of reading had slipped outside of his fingers quite early.

‘I sadly must say that I haven’t’.

Unsurprisingly insolence stayed on your face.

But it was also some kind of teasing innocence.

‘… it is actually an interesting and timeless story’ you explained, a twinkle of easiness on your face ‘… slutshaming is still very much real in here, since Venable would also oblige us to wear a scarlet letter on our chest, would she ever find out that somebody had sex with somebody else in here’.

Michael wondered whether you were you such a smartass always or only in the book department.

Either way, Michael enjoyed it thoroughly.

You seemed slightly less guarded off in the library and he could only guess that it felt the same way he felt in his own private chamber.

Hidden behind his extravagant clothes and his father’s influence.

‘You think that those rules are ridiculous’ it wasn’t a question and yet you nodded lightly ‘… well, I do find them a bit antique myself’.

‘You’d expect the dresses would be a torture enough’ you muttered, as you shot his a softer look ‘… and the poor Greys… it is almost… horrible how they are treated… very Charles Dickens’.

There was a light twinkle of madness as you said that and he could clearly see that although you had admitted that you didn’t want to go to the Sanctuary, you weren’t neither interested in staying here further.

‘Have you ever thought about stopping your survival instinct’ he wanted to ask you, but he knew that one wrong question would destroy all the soft climate that had appeared between you two, so he preferred to steer the conversation on human literature, something that got you quite passionate.

And he admired that love and that passion.

To be loved with such intensity it must have a thoroughly miraculous experience.

And he dreamt about it that night.

The following day he found himself in the library again and soon enough he discovered much more than your literary tastes.

He discovered your favorite colors and as he dressed himself up each morning, he wore them, discovering that they immediately caught your eyes, in a way that seemed like some kind of animal mating ritual.

What had the Antichrist reduced himself to be just for the touch of a small flame of your love?

A complete actor and a clown at your service,

But slowly the ice in your personality started melting and he found that you had started to lean on his company as if you enjoyed it, encouraged it, even, although this didn’t mean that you had opened up to him in any way of shape.

And by this time Michael wasn’t sure whether you’d ever open up to him.

But you had your own way of showing devotion and interest.

Exactly as he did.

Once he had gotten quite along with you, he had given you his ring as a way to show that he somehow trusted you.

As a way to get you to know that he felt respect for you, although it was all hidden behind the premise of you ‘taking care of it’.

But it was a different show of rank and also it was a show of devotion and interest.

And when you had started wearing it, on a small chain around your neck, the pendant coming slowly to set itself on your chest whenever you stood up, in a way that made it pass unnoticed to everyone except you two.

And soon your crush had flared up.

Michael had been shocked when you had moved closer to him, in one of his afternoon library session, as you closed the book you were reading, ‘Pride and Prejudice’ one of your favorites definitely.

‘… you must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire you’ you had said loudly, almost as if you were sure this would be a big fail or an even bigger success, and then you had moved closer to him, something shy and clumsy in your antics as you pressed your lips against his.

And Michael, exactly like a clumsy teenager, as well was slow in his reply to you, pawing your shoulder harshly but you still kept your lips locked a few minutes more to make sure that it wasn’t an accident.

And when you separated you were looking at him expectantly.

‘… isn’t that what I am supposed to say?’ he asked softly, a small smile on your face, softness and genuineness appearing in both your faces.

‘I just thought that I am more Mr. Darcy between us two’ you commented and Michael suddenly felt very surprised by the fact that you knew about your behavior, your secretiveness and your shyness, the walls that blocked him from properly getting to know you ‘… it is just that… you are… you are not who I expected to fall in love with’.

A strange rage had filled him at that, matched with an uneasy annoyance at himself.

It was always the same story: he got rejected.

And you didn’t even know he was the antichrist.

‘… you definitely looked out of my league’ there was a glint of amusement in your eyes and a peak of relief in Michael’s chest as he came closer to you, the second kiss being definitely less messy than the first one, and the one that followed after.

And the one after.

And before he knew it you were both in his chambers, completely disrupting Venable’s rule about fornicating with each other.

And it felt good.

And those walls that you had up had come down, since you had let him in yourself in a way that had made him feel almost understood, as you fought for dominance and power under the sheets, before it settled in a small victory on his part.

Although from the moans, you definitely enjoyed it.

And now you were simply enjoying the quiet.

The quiet before the storm, since he knew that he couldn’t deny the true nature of his powers, anymore to you.

But he could delay the reveal a bit, as you smiled at him.

And your smile held the sweetest of secrets.

And he was glad he hadn’t solved each one you held.

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Michael Langdon Taglist (I don’t really have a taglist anymore, so if you are interested on being there for Michael do let me know, and I’ll add you, if I ever think about writing something for him again!):

@blakewaterxx

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1dsource · 5 years ago

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Ziam writers in this fandom need a lot of love, just like our larry writers, so here is our first Ziam fic rec! The theme of this fic rec is Friends to Lovers!

Please show these authors some extra love and leave a kudos, and even a comment if you have the time. It’s important we also give the newer, unknown authors a chance so they keep having motivation to write more amazing stories for us all to read <3

Fools, and Worthless Liars. by aliceninetyfive I 115K I Haunted hotel, winter

Louis and Liam decide to go work a winter season in a snow resort in the Alps during their gap year. They get placed in Austria, where they meet a bunch of familiar faces including Zayn, Harry, Niall and various others you're bound to recognise doing the same thing!

Featuring our old favourites angst, pining, self discovery, ot5, and a side helping of a haunted hotel & gorgeous alpine scenery.

Compartment 451 by ziamhaze I 88K I Harry Potter universe

Zayn’s a muggleborn wizard whose parents leave him to fend for himself once he’s made aware of his magical abilities. The Payne’s are an open minded wizarding family, who take him in and provide the boy with a loving home before he and their overly excited son Liam, go off to Hogwarts for the first time. Liam introduces Zayn to the wonderful world of magic, while Zayn teaches the pureblood about a way of life he’s never known. Somewhere between laser tag tutorials and petting Hebridean Black dragons, Zayn falls for the newly appointed Head Boy, but his three other nonconforming friends aren’t about to let the Ravenclaw go through his last year of school without letting Liam in on his feelings once and for all.

Money Moves by mmaree I 74K I Fake Relationship I Boss/Employee

“I’ll cut straight to the chase,” Liam announces. He leans forward, and Zayn is met with steely eyes and steepled fingers. “I’m willing to offer you fifty grand if you’ll enter into a small…partnership with me. This would be in addition to your salary at Payne Innovations, of course. Think of it as a bonus.”

Zayn narrows his eyes. “What kind of partnership?”

“A fake engagement.”

“Oh,” Zayn says, relieved it’s nothing illegal. “Wait—what?”

“A fake engagement,” his boss repeats slowly, as if he’s convinced Zayn’s comprehension skills are significantly lacking. “For six months. Maybe less if I can pull it off sooner but don’t worry—you’ll be paid the full sum regardless of how long it takes.”

Zayn’s suspicious, and he doesn’t even know why. There’s nothing to be suspicious of because, clearly, Liam’s lost the plot. Zayn’s having a conversation with a complete nutter. There’s no other reasonable explanation.

He clears his throat, searches Liam’s eyes for a sign he's taking the piss. “How long what takes?”

A smile plays at Liam’s lips. “For me to be hired as the CTO at Titan Technologies.”

Half A Heart by ginger_with_a_black_cat I 68K I Friends with Benefits

Zayn is an English student who doesn't want to fall in love because his biggest fear is to get hurt again. Liam is a resident bad boy and everyone's wet dream on the outside, but in the inside he's a secret even to himself. Harry's Liam's best friend with a secret of his own. Louis likes to party hard, get drunk and get everyone in trouble but everybody loves him nonetheless. And then, there's Niall, who's the youngest of them all, but still has the most brains and keeps them all in order all while being in love with an impossible girl.

Or where Zayn gets hit in the head by his own actions, Liam finds himself falling for an idiot, Harry gets dragged out of the closet by the love of his life, Louis wants Harry and only Harry and Niall just wants all of them to get their shit together, so he can get his own life back.

and you take me the way i am by orphan_account I 54K I Fake Relationship

It’s incredibly relaxing, even in this small space, the way they’ve always been. Such a distraction that he doesn’t think, not for once, about agreeing to lie to his family and Zayn pretending to be his date and how easy all of this might be.

(Liam needs a date to a wedding. His family loves to match him up with blind dates. He doesn't want that. He needs a date... and, well, why not Zayn. Pretending to be boyfriends for a weekend isn't the worst idea he supposes. Liam is horribly wrong.)

some moments are rare by orphan_account I 46K I Uni au

The city blinks awake outside but Zayn falls asleep with his nose pressed to Liam’s coffee-stain of a birthmark.

(or, alternatively: Zayn is spending a summer studying aboard; thirty days across Europe, with his best mate by his side. It's always been like this ― Zayn and Liam. And he's always been a bit daft about love, or the fact that Liam's always been in love with him. It's all a bit of a mess, actually.)

Just As Fast, Twice As Dangerous by lightswoodmagic I 45K I Superpowers

When he realised it was only him and Liam in the hallway, he felt safe enough to drop his shield. Oh. Lovely. Liam was emanating affection and fondness, his primary emotions filled with warmth and love. Zayn let himself bask in it, how it would feel to be loved by Liam. He knew Liam loved him, but he wasn’t in love with him; Zayn had felt that emotion too many times to count, and this just wasn’t it. He dug slightly deeper, could feel that Liam was excited and nervous, and when he hit a wall Liam had built himself, he dropped back. He wasn’t supposed to know everything.

Or, Zayn's a normal student by day, and a superhero by night. When a mysterious man seems to target him at the same time a natural disaster strikes, Zayn has to figure out a way to save the day, protect his heart, and convince the boys he's not a vigilante all at the same time.

down the vista of years by ohthathurt I 30K I Time Travel

Zayn whispered, “So where do we go from here?”

Liam shrugged, seemingly lost in thought. Then he smiled down at his boyfriend, “Forward?”

Zayn smiled serenely, eyes twinkling like gold in the sun seeping through the open windows.

He nodded, “Forward.”

Just the two of us and a cute little cup of cyanide by orphan_account I 17K I Accidental Marriage

“I definitely need something alcoholic if I’m going to watch my two best mates divorce,” Niall says, yanking a top over his head.

“We’re not actually married,” Liam says, with slightly more force than intended. “It was an accident. Obviously I wouldn’t ever get married to Zayn if I was sober, that’s fucking ridiculous.”

The bathroom door opens suddenly and Zayn stands there in nothing but a towel, bottom lip trapped between his teeth. Liam opens his mouth to say something but Zayn holds up his hand, shaking his head. “You don’t need to be a dick about it, Liam. This isn’t exactly how I envisioned my first marriage going either.”

Or an I-accidentally-married-my-best-mate-in-Vegas fic, where Liam's completely oblivious, Zayn's completely in love, Harry's had enough, Louis plays mediator and Niall just wants his best friends to be with each other.

i'm watching you run from the sidelines by thebeehive I 17K I

“One week,” Zayn cajoled. “C’mon Leeyum. After one week if you hate it that much, you can go. But just stay one week.”

“In Pennsylvania. On your farm. In the middle of nowhere.”

Liam looked at his phone, but it held no answers. Zayn couldn’t be serious. Liam hadn’t stopped traveling the world after the band went on hiatus. He never stopped. Dubai one week, London the next, and then L.A. It didn’t really matter where, as long as he kept moving. But he missed Zayn, missed his former band mate. His former friend. He hadn’t seen him in person in years. And it couldn’t be that bad, on a farm, could it?

Liam sighed. “Fine. A week. But your wifi better be fucking spectacular, mate.”

{Or, Zayn invites Liam to his farm for a week to help him relax. Things don’t go as planned.}

fooled around and fell in love by tachycardia I 15K I Fake Relationship

“I have a proposal - a proposition,” Liam corrects quickly. “For you.”

Liam and Zayn pretend to be engaged.

a river flows so surely to the sea by kettering I 14K I Uni au

It’s August, not a cloud in the sky, and two boys who’ve been smitten with each other for going on a decade are tying the knot.

get a little bit nervous by louistomlinsons I 14K I

Liam goes to say something, probably something dumb, but he chokes on his spit, coughing loudly. The man in front of him is one of the prettiest people he’s ever seen in his life; he’s got thick eyelashes that fan out and frame his dark eyes and tanned unblemished skin. Liam forgets all of his previous thoughts.

“You okay, mate?” he asks, concern filtering into his voice.

“Yeah, yeah,” Liam says, still choking and coughing. “Sorry.”

“We all reacted the same way we saw Zayn for the first time,” Niall says from next to him, laughter evident in his tone. “He’s a god, isn’t he?”

or, ziam farmer's market au where liam, louis, and niall work at the produce stand, harry and zayn work at the bakery stand, and nobody's straight

Tell me tomorrow (I'll wait by the window for you) by orphan_account I 13K

“You’re, like, beautiful,” Liam says, and it’s said so earnestly and with such conviction that Zayn can hardly believe that they don’t know each other in real life. “God, I’m cacking it now.”

“Don’t,” Zayn says shyly. “We’re both people, it… it will be what it will.”

“Can’t wait,” Liam says softly. “I’m nervous, yeah, but I really can’t fucking wait.”

“Me neither,” Zayn grins. “Less than seventeen hours to go now, babe.”

Or a Gavin and Stacey AU where Zayn pines, Liam's nervous, Louis's loud, Harry's a little odd and Niall just loves an omelette.

This Is Somethin' Real by lightswoodmagic I 5K I

Zayn had felt it before, felt the hope and the possibility of something brewing, but where he usually pushed it down, he let it consume him now, let it take over everything until he was swinging his feet and grinning when Niall finally walked through the door.

“Lads!”

“Nialler!” Louis shouted, wrapping him up in a hug.

“How is everyo – woah, why are you so happy?” he asked Zayn, cackling when Zayn kicked out at him.

“He’s going to tell Payno he’s in love with him tonight, that’s why,” Louis explained, and Zayn saw Harry’s nose scrunch as he smiled.

Again, if you read, please remember to leave kudos and/or a comment so we keep motivating our lovely, talented writers and make them feel valued

#ziam #fics #ficmp #friends to lovers

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nalufever · 5 years ago

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do you have any more nalu fic recs?

Sorry, not sorry - you’ve unleashed more than you could’ve guessed. ^^ Always happy to Recommend a List of Fics ~ And thank you for asking! Admittedly there’s a few Recs that aren’t Nalu - I got excited to share my favs. ;)

A Girl Worth Fighting For: Natsu navigates unspeakable horrors to win Lucy’s love or Natsu goes shopping, looking for the perfect white day gift.

A Lesson: Natsu and Lucy can’t keep themselves from expressing their passions - and the results are bed breaking. Short but smutty - smexy in fact. ;P

A Solidly Constructed Kiss: Erza strong-arms Lucy and Natsu into working the Kissing Booth to raise funds for a school trip. Lucy’s never been kissed and Natsu acts like he’s never entertained even the idea of kissing another person. Things naturally come to a head when Lucy and Natsu are given the task to build the actual booth; will they fight over construction or build themselves some kind of relationship?

Fairy Tail Week: A collection of drabbles from tumblr prompts to celebrate Fairy Tail. Fairy, Ladies, Lads, Magic, Guild, Ultimate Team, Stronger, Mashima, Tail. Only rated teen to err on the side of caution, family friendly content featuring most of the Fairy Tail Guild!

Feathers and Scales: Angel/Demon AU. Devils are more than they seem and Angels no less. Pitted against each other in a never-ending battle for souls, a single Angel and Devil trade mercies and fall in love. Warning: major character death(s).

Full Moon Secret: Natsu had wanted to tell Lucy his secrets, to share his family history with the fey…it had just never been the right time. Tonight the truth was going to be revealed, one way or another.

Okay, I could just keep hyping all of my own fics individually - but I won’t - other than to just put in a link to ALL OF THEM. ;) Fair warning, I have a few other fandoms works in all the Fairy Tail stories - from Brooklyn 99 to The Flash, Snow White with the Red Hair, RWBY, Blue Exorcist, Teen Titans and some Hakuouki. Yes, I’m a shameless self-promoter. Speaking of that - one more I need to rec! Natsu’s Stars in Lucy’s Sky. I swear Imma finish this.

I also have more than a few favourite authors who write for Fairy Tail (and other fandoms) ~ some have not contributed lately to Fairy Tail or chosen to concentrate on other fandoms - but I like them and their excellent writing.

ObsessedwithNalu: One of my first fandom friends and pretty much any of her FT stories is gold. @obsessedwithnalu

Christmas Treats: Admittedly a gift to me and very cherished for that fact - and - it’s frigging awesome. Lucy does a little holiday baking at home before Fairy Tail’s Christmas party. Natsu, as always, is there. One thing leads to another…

Thanks, Krov: When Krov decided to relax at his favorite bar after work, he never imagined that he’d be seeing some of his old guild members, especially since he thought they had died long ago. Nalu fluff.

Edo-Nalu love fest: Submissions for the Nalu love fest week of 2014. But instead of regular Nalu, these ones feature Edo-Nalu. Smut-tastic and delightfully mature.

ImpracticalDemon: Another early fandom friend who’s still writing this, that and the other thing - and she’s just GREAT. Again, a link to all her works and a few that are special to me follow. XOXOX @impracticaldemon

May the Best Man Survive: “Gray would never have in a million years thought he’d host Natsu’s bachelor party (Nalu pairing). Why is it his job to herd the bunch of rowdy mages from bar to bar, ending up at the guild where the real surprise party is? Oh yeah, the idiot had asked him to be the best man at his wedding. Hijinks, chaos and hilarity ensue.” ^^ A prompt supplied by me and I’m smirking so wide because the fic Imp came up with delivered more awesomeness than I could have hoped for!

A Star At His Side: “Accidentally Fall Asleep Together” for Endragoneel on tumblr. Natsu and Lucy spend the day together at a festival in Magnolia. Natsu ends up watching more than just the stars when the festival is over…

Christmas Gifts: When Erza walks Wendy home from the Guild’s Christmas Party, Wendy realizes how alone her friend and mentor is feeling. She sets out to recruit Lucy, Natsu and the rest to break Jellal out of prison for just one night, as a Christmas gift for Erza. Meanwhile, Natsu has accidentally burned some of Lucy’s writing. Will she forgive him?

Dark Shining Light: One of the best and most welcoming writers I have ever interacted with! I’m still gobsmacked she’s a friend! She’s a legend and I don’t know what else I could add to any discourse about her writing - but the classics are classic for a reason, yeah? Here’s a few of my personal favourites of her works and just know there’s too many to list them all! AKA @ff-darkshininglight

Mischievous Cat: Let’s just say there have been a few incidents where Happy has come in at a bad time.

What Belongs to a Demon: Everyone knew she belonged to the great demon lord and she would prove that she deserved to stand by his side.

The Truth Revealing Cards: Lucy should have known if there was a card that would reveal her secrets, Natsu would want it.

Eliz1369: Got introduced to her for her Hakuoki fics but she’d dipped her toes into FT as well ~ and this is a great fic. ^^ @eliz1369

The Light of Fairy Tail: The members of Fairy Tail may be their own brand of crazy, but their hearts are always in the right place.

rougescribe: Shame on me for not reading more of this author’s works! @rougescribe

Fire Sprite No 5: For him, Heaven wasn’t a place or a single moment in time. It was a feeling built on memories upon memories, past and present and a hope for future ones all tied down together. All sharing one common denominator: Her. Nalu. Tumblr Valentine’s Event.

Fallen Ark Angel: Admittedly I only have interacted from afar with this writer. I mainly read Nalu fics but I love her take on Mira and Laxus and her next gen offspring characters. She’s got a lot to offer and it’s all superb. @fallen029

Loving Satan: Loving Satan is never easy. But when she loves you back, its twice as bad.

Madartiste: Another one-sided love affair with someone else’s writing. And her stories are all wonderful and prolly appear on hundreds of Fic Rec Lists - but here’s one of my Favs! @madartiste

Hoarding: Getting interrupted gets old fast.

UranoMetria: I added her to my stable of fav authors 05-03-2014. Wow. Eons ago and even if I’m not sure she’s still active in the fandom, I salute her. Kudos.

The Goddess Gate: With six years of partnership, Natsu and Lucy are torn apart by a mysterious visit from a secret magic council. Lucy is kidnapped and her memories suppressed. She fights her way back home to regain her life - with a startling secret revealed as she begins to remember. The lives of all Earthland hang in the balance. **Okay, this is a wicked old fic - but amazingly written and fuelled my own desires for writing. Last updated in 2018 but who knows? Some current attention may slay any demons on her back in regards to writing - and even if not - the hours of enjoyment reading this is worth giving a comment just to say, ‘thank you for writing.‘

Wild Rhov: Do I even need to say anything about this author? Famous, famous, famous. Excellent. Writes a lot of pairings and fleshes every relationship into something REAL. I Can’t Even. @wildrhov

Beastly Possession: Something is murdering people in Magnolia. When Lucy is attacked, Natsu goes on a rampage to find the culprit, and everyone in Fairy Tail wants revenge. But could this bloodthirsty attacker be someone they know? Warning: High octane nightmare fuel! Do not read while eating, and beware of red eyes in the dark!

Shell1331: Introduced via Imp. This writer is in a few fandoms and is worth reading. @shell-senji

Juicy: Impulsivity and poorly chosen words get Natsu into more trouble than he’d expected, which is saying something for him.

AbsentAngel: Everyone should know this writer. Been stalking her since 2014 so that says something. Tho, it’s prolly just that I’m creepy. ;) My suggested fic here is being re-written/has been? into something original and worth being purchased when it becomes available and re-read over and over. No, I am not being paid to shill but I am open to having senpai notice me. @absent-angel

To the Flame: She stares, transfixed, as the blood runs down his fingers and begins to pool in his palm. He holds his hand up to her lips in offering, and she tears her eyes away from the blood to study his face. He is smiling softly. “Go on Luce, I didn’t cut them for nothing.” [Vamp AU]

HawkofNavarre: Loved for awesome and delightful Gruvia content. Looks like there’s a tumblr but I can’t manage to link it. :(

You Stole the Rain: He just wanted to be friends; fine, she just needed to change his mind. Gray x Juvia

Ricardian Scholar Clark-Weasley: Not sure I spelled that right even after checking three times! I usually short hand that to RS-CW in my head. And she’s prolific - has a tonne of fandoms and is a tower of talent. Is anyone reading all my fangirl gushing? 'Cause she follows one of my fics and comments (sorry I haven’t updated that fic in a while) and it’s a source of happiness that someone who writes so well happens to enjoy some of my content. Okay, bragging over - back to the Recs!

Tales of Fairies: A collection of oneshots exploring different friendships, ideas, sad themes, comical scenarios, and lots and lots of pairings…but mainly Nalu.

snogfairy: Another giant in the FT fandom. Impressive talent. @lineffability

naughty nalus: smutty nalu oneshots B) ***Mature content!***

Rivendell101: Another giant in FT and other fandoms. This author would be considered required reading if I ran a fandom course in a University setting. Just sayin’ @rivendell101

Crave: /krāv/ Verb. To feel a powerful desire for (something). They crave each other. And satiation doesn’t come easily. He growls against her again. “Beg for it,” he demands, lips ghosting against her.

Lakerae aka @hidetheremote : Did you think I’d forgotten you? Ha! Gotcha good! You’re an inspiration to me because you’re working so hard to publish your children’s books. Kudos to you li'l sis! You’re busy but still make it a point to talk to me and I love you for that and everything.

The Gift of the Magi: A Gajevy Twist: A retelling of the classic Christmas story “The Gift of the Magi,” with your favorite Fairy Tail couple Gajeel and Levy! It’s Christmas time and Gajeel and Levy exchange gifts. They both are surprised what they receive and learn a lesson of the true meaning of Christmas.

I could add more and more as I search my saved favs on FF.net ~ and I’m sorry to not include all of them - but this is crazy long as it is. If you read and like any of the recommended fics, please be sure to let the author know. To the authors of these and all fanfics, Thanks for everything.

#fic list #rec fic list #fan fics galore #mainly Nalu rec'd fics #sorry not sorry #asks #answered #more than poor anon bargained for

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unsettledink · 4 years ago

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Back in the days of LJ, I used to try and do a post at the end of each year, looking back primarily at fandom and fic. I fell out of the habit when everything moved to tumblr, and then it seemed like I didn’t have anything to say since I wasn’t writing or really participating any.

But I always liked the idea of it, because I love to be overly reflective on stuff. And talk about my fic. Any excuse! I shuffled around some of the topics I used back then and added a few I’ve seen around that I liked. It got… long, because I TALK, so I split into two sections.

Your main fandom of the year?

Marvel (MCU) for sure. Primarily with characters from Spider-Man and Iron Man movies.

Your favorite film watched this year?

The Old Guard - I saw a couple trailers and everything about it looked like catnip. ‘It’s probably going to be so dumb, but I don’t even care,’ I thought. And then it was so good. It was so much fun and so much smarter than I expected and I loved each and every character and it just made me happy in so many ways.

Your favorite book read this year?

Red, White, and Royal Blue, Casey McQuiston - I read it twice this year actually. It’s so… cute isn’t the right world. Sweet and hopeful and soft and comforting and intense. I liked every single character which is pretty rare. I cried during the sad parts and then again at the happy ending, like straight up sobbed - both times. I already want to read it again.

Your favorite tv show watched this year?

Schitt’s Creek - I started it on a whim and because a lot of people had said it was good. The episodes were short so it wasn’t a huge time investment. The first season was a little rough, but there were enough funny moments that I hung on, and then… I kept getting fonder and fonder of these idiots as they grew. And THEN… it kept not disappointing me?

You grow to expect certain scripts, twists, jokes, especially in queer story lines. To wait for the bad thing to happen, because it always does. Instead, Schitt’s Creek kept going, ‘hey, here’s the set up for that! Guess what? We’re not doing it. Here’s the happy version instead.’ The relief of having that happen again and again - the last season I’ve watched (I’m sort of saving 6) I cried a bunch but it was always because I was happy.

Your favorite album or song to listen to this year?

1896 - I’ve been waiting for the new Steam Powered Giraffe album so eagerly for aaaaaages. Finally getting recordings of Zero’s songs! Lying Awake remains my favorite off the album, with Eat Your Heart and Bad Days on the Horizon high up there as well. I’m loving what Zero brings to the band.

Your best new fandom discovery of the year?

I don’t know if I really did discover that much? I stuck pretty closely to old fandoms and the ones I picked up in 2019. Maybe Zodiac? It was definitely inspiring, and I want to write and read more in it.

Maybe the couple discords I joined? I still really dislike discord and am not on there much, and mostly lurk when I am, but having somewhere vaguely like the comms I remember makes me feel a little less isolated. It’s the potential, that maybe if I said something I might make a friend, or someone might actually want to hear what I say.

Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?

The Watch - I mean, I knew it was going to be a disaster with every word said during pre production. I wasn’t ever going to be happy with it. And then it came out and was even worse and uglier and … disrespectful not just of the source material but of actual people connected to Terry. I’m beyond disappointed that this is what we got, and it’s probably going to be a long time before we get anything else.

Devil All the Time was terrible, but I didn’t have especially high hopes. It still didn’t manage to meet them. Yikes.

The most missed of your old fandoms?

Maybe MASH? Someone I follow started talking about it and I was reminded all over again of the wonderful fics in that fandom. I went looking and a lot are gone (still on my computer, lol, but not online), but rereading was such a trip. A slightly depressing trip, but still.

The fandom you haven't tried yet, but want to?

Hmm. I’ve kind of not had the energy to invest in other fandoms at the moment? When The Witcher was having it’s big moment back in January, I had a feeling I might enjoy it enough to fall headfirst into the fandom, so I avoided watching it. Ikr? I don’t have the time or the energy to actively seek anything out.

Your biggest fan anticipations for the New Year?

SO EXCITED about Winter’s Orbit. I mean, the third Spider-Man movie for sure, with worry. The second Venom movie, ugh yes. I have tentative hopes for Jungle Cruise? Jumanji was stellar and I always enjoy Dwayne. I have both hope and dread for the new Suicide Squad - I did love Birds of Prey, so if it’s along those lines, yay. The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard because it should be some fun garbage, my favorite kind. I don’t know how I feel about Dune, but, uh, I’m anticipating it. It seems highly unlikely it will actually happen, but The Wheel of Time TV series.

I want to be excited about Black Widow but it’s hard. It’s not the story I’ve been wanting to see, and I’m angry about Natasha not getting a movie until she’s dead.

You know. If any of it is released for real.

The Good:

I moved to a better place. I got a better paying, better benefits, better environment job that lets me work from home. The house acquired 3-7 more cats depending on the month. I was able to get some serious problems on my car fixed. I have insurance and was able to start on some health stuff. No one I know got sick or died. I wrote a LOT.

The Bad:

Aside from the obvious? Depression hitting extra hard during the winter. Having to put two kittens to sleep. Have my car be hit three times in our parking lot. Being driven INSANE by one of the cats for months while the vets were all closed. Kidney stone. Dealing with several health problems. Stalling for months on Gotcha.

The Indifferent:

Not leaving the house often or easily. Enjoying a new fandom but not doing great at making connections (still real awkward, bud). Raising kittens and saying goodbye. Need new tires. Reading a lot of fic but not a lot of books. Having more pay but more expenses as well (wth insurance??).

2020 fic stats

Number of stories: 39

Number of fandoms: 6? Or 2, if you cluster the others under mcu

Total number of words: 152049

Average word count per story: 4kish

Longest fic: Causality (18k, P/Q)

Shortest fic: Can’t, Won’t (1k, P/Q)

Most comments received: Sieche (49, T/P)

Fandom you wrote the most of: MCU Spider-Man - I only wrote TWO fics that didn’t feature that fandom, wow. And one of those was still MCU.

Fandom you wrote the least of: Zodiac (1!)

Events you participated in: Marvel Trumps Hate, Kinktober, IornspidersGeorg Exchange, Starker Festivals Exchange, MCU Secret Santa, Spiderio Big Bang

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted?

SO MUCH MORE OMG. I mean, even just counting posted stuff! (I probably wrote a solid 300k of Gotcha this year.) I did not expect or plan on doing Kinktober, so that’s a whole 31 fics right there. I also wasn’t planning on doing any exchanges - I have a History - but then I did three? And beyond that, I did not expect for everything to get so LONG.

Topic you wrote that you would never have predicted in January:

Tony/Quentin. Goddammit @the-me09 They were like hey, they could be interesting! And while I agreed, I had no ideas for them. THEN they had to go and write Just Bodies That Collide and next thing I know, I’ve got ten fics featuring them and two-six series focused on them or Peter/Quentin/Tony. What the fuck.

Leitmotif of the year:

Vulnerability, I think. I had a bunch of things typed up and they all circle back to vulnerability in the end; sex, being seen, being wanted, sharing trauma, asking for help, trying something new. Offering a soft spot in the hopes it won’t be hurt.

Favorite character to write about:

Tony Stark, for sure. There are just a bunch of slightly different takes, and a lot of canon to work with (kind of frustrating too though). And I’m a sucker for emotionally damaged snarky traumatized characters that are viewed poorly both in universe and out.

Favorite kind of fic to write:

This year? Fluff and smut combined. Maybe that’s not the right term really. I keep looking for and writing, even in the angstiest fics, for those soft moments. Sure, maybe it’s a super smutty kink scene, but I want the affection to be obvious. Maybe everyone is consumed by guilt, but I want it to be based in caring too much. Maybe there’s no real love, just sex and even that’s messed up, but I want to find that tiny bit of fondness.

And I want happy endings. Or endings that look like they’re going to be happy, at least, even if there’s all the angst first. I don’t think I’ve killed anyone this year? Who AM I?

Biggest disappointment:

Not finishing the rough draft of Gotcha. I was making such good progress in 2019, from August to December. Even after the move, I basically finished part 6 in January. I fumbled around and fussed with 1 a lot, but that had already been given one draft, really, and I got through half of 4 before I slowed to a stop. I’ve barely gotten anything accomplished on it since June. Bits and pieces here and there, but nothing significant, not like I was doing. I can excuse October, due to 80k invested in Kinktober (yikes!), but aside from that… I’m sad. I’ll finish it eventually, but I really thought I could have the first draft done in a year. I’m sitting at about 480k out of what I’m almost certain will be 700k.

Biggest surprise:

Kinktober! It was kind of spur of the moment, decided just a week in advance. I’ve tried month long or even like, 20-25 day long challenges and I don’t think I’ve ever completed one. I thought there was a good chance I’d do so again, so I gave myself a little help and made my own list of prompts, things I knew I liked and hadn’t done much of yet. And it worked? I actually completed it, what the hell? Despite spending five days travelling near the end! Despite falling behind in getting ahead and writing a bunch of stories the day they were to be posted! Despite apparently forgetting how to do short form!

I, uh, could have done without the spawning of eleven series or sequels or continuations jfc WHY SELF.

Something you learned this year:

Ideas breed ideas. I swear to god, the second I sit down to think through a current idea, I wake up the next morning with three more.

Words need to be restocked. I need to consume new - not rereads, not fic - content every so often to refresh my word bank. It is astonishing how quickly writing goes again after I’ve done so.

I can write so much more than I thought I could. I can do so much more than I thought I could. Yes, I can complete challenges without dropping out early. Yes, I can do exchanges and not regret it. Yes, I can write more than 100k, more than 200k, more and more - and I can write 10k+ easily too. Though I wouldn’t mind if I could once again write less than 10k without feeling like I’ve cut off in the middle.

My time is shrinking, and if I want to write as much, I’m going to have to make the time. I can’t rely on three days off a week, on seven hours of uninterrupted overnight shifts, on hyper focused writing binges that leave everything else around me on fire.

Most memorable comment:

So, so many! I can’t pick one. I’ve been really lucky to get a bunch of really detailed, enthusiastic, analyzing comments across all different fics. One of the types that always sticks with me are the ones like ‘I didn’t think/know I liked this ship/kink/twist, but fuck, apparently I do? You made me, what the hell?’.

What, if anything, are you going to try to do differently in your writing in the new year?

So with writing Gotcha but not posting until it’s done, my view of what I’ve written vs anyone else’s is extremely skewed. I’m sitting here thinking, hey I’m 400k in and got another 10k done today, so much writing! While anyone looking at my AO3 account (for most of the year) is like, you’re averaging three months between fics :(

All that to say I want to try and get something posted more frequently while I’m working on Gotcha.

Also, writing for kinktober was really interesting - pushing myself to write every single day, often for that day’s post, forced me to get back into shorter form fic. Which used to be all I did? But it was surprisingly hard to just stop and not write more. So I’d like to challenge myself to write more fics under 10k at least. Maybe even under 5k though that might be asking a lot lol. I might get there with the many continuations of those fics I’d like to do. Does that count?

Goals:

I want to hit 365 fics. :) I’m only 32 away!

Aside from writing -

I’ve really enjoyed the reading record sideblog I started this year. I’ve let it lapse a little the past month or so, but I’d like to keep it going strong.

I’d like to leave a lot more comments. I want to get better about allowing imperfection - I want to write The Best Comment, but in the end? Probably 90% of fic writers are going to be happier with a comment expressing enjoyment in any way over no comment at all.

And not just on fics, but on general posts as well. It’s hard not to feel… weird and stupid and invasive and rude leaving any sort of comment on someone’s post if I don’t know them at least a little. I have godawful rejection sensitive dysphoria and a lot of interactions that ended poorly; I’m really not good at people. But as dumb as it feels to say those things, I know I am thrilled and warmed and happier when there’s a reblog with tags or a note or a comment or an ask or just, any small interaction that shows someone out there notices and cares, at least a little. There’s no reason I can’t at least try to offer that to other people.

I’d like to make/run a couple challenges of my own, later in the year. I’m still figuring out what I want to do and what I could do. I’m really interested in doing something that’s not focused on creators, but the readers; some sort of comment or rec challenge maybe.

I want to find a cheerleader for Gotcha. I’m struggling to keep up my motivation to write it when it’s already in my head, where I can ‘read’ it any time. There’s a line between depending too much on external validation and trying to generate all your validation yourself, and I’m getting to a point where I think I need to ask for help (gasp! The hardest thing EVER).

(Part Two: Pick Some Fics)

#end of year #unsettled rambles

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thewebcomicsreview · 5 years ago

Note

hussie said a thing abt the epilogues reddit. com/r/homestuck/comments/cuywff/the_homestuck_epilogues_bridges_and_offramps_new/

I also think many of the negative feelings the story creates isn’t just an urgent prompt for the reader to imagine different ideas, or ways to resolve the new narrative dilemmas. It’s also an opportunity for people to discuss any of the difficult content critically, and for fandom in general to continue developing the tools for processing the negative emotions art can generate. Sorting that out has to be a communal experience, and it’s an important part of the cycle between creating and criticizing art. I think not only can creators develop their skills to create better things by practicing and taking certain risks, fandom is something which can develop better skills as well. Skills like critical discussion, dealing constructively with negative feelings resulting from the media they consume, interacting with each other in more meaningful ways, and trying to understand different points of view outside of the factions within fandom that can become very hardened over time. Fandoms everywhere tend to get bad reputations for various reasons, maybe justifiably. But I don’t see why it can’t be an objective to try to improve fandom, just as creators can improve their work. And I think this can only happen if now and then fandoms are seriously challenged, by being encouraged to think about complex ideas, and made to feel difficult emotions. I believe when art creates certain kinds of negative feelings in people, it can lead to some of the most transformative experiences art has to offer. But it helps to be receptive to this idea for these experiences to have a positive net effect on your life, and your relationship with art.

Christ, he’s gone full Lennon. Imagine a good ending. I wonder if you can.

So, I’ve mentioned this a few times, but the most transformative art has ever been for me was a comic that actually started on the Homestuck forums

Prequel - Or - Making The Cat Cry: The Adventure - is a comic written by Kazared loosely based on the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. It’s about a Khajiit girl named Katia who moves to OblivionLand to make a new life for herself, and the comic spent years building Katia up to bigger and bigger heights so that every time she crashed she crashed harder than ever before. The second time she relapses into alcoholism is where a lot of readers give up on the comic for being misery porn.

There’s a point where she she’s solved all her problems and even gets to join the mages guild - her lifelong dream - only for the woman running the Kvatch mage guild to mild control her into giving up all her stuff, including the stuff important to Katia’s only friend. Katia is left naked on the streets literally digging through trash in the vain hope of trying to find a solution to at least one of her problems. And what she finds is a bottle of beer.

Twice already in this comic Katia hit a really bad patch and started drinking again. The comic has twice made us root for Katia to succeed, only to jump cut to her waking up in a stranger’s bed with no memory of what happened.

She wanders into an empty church (OBVIOUS SYMBOLISM ALERT), and alternates between trying to find some supplies and fantasizing about everything magically getting fixed, which slowly morphs into fantasizing about drinking while getting increasingly furious at barrels for not having clothes in them.

One thing. You wanted one thing and you were too much of a fucking idiot to realize it was hopeless and pointless and bound to ruin everything. Stuck on some childish idea that you could be anything, do anything, and just be some selfish bitch that’s never happy with what she has. Fuck, you don’t even know what you’re mad at anymore, you just hate yourself and everything you ever ruined for yourself and everyone and want to stop thinking about what a worthless mindless thoughtless imbecile you are. You just want to stop fucking thinking about it.

You drop onto the chapel floor and just cry. You cry and cry because you’re stupid and easy and can’t fix anything no matter how hard you try. You cry because your best is worse than everyone else’s average. You cry because your parents never loved you and you’re a disappointment to everyone, even yourself. You cry because all you wanted was to be someone and that’s never going to happen. And when that’s done, you cry a little more because you’re ashamed of being such a crybaby.

You try to get all the emotions out, try to clear your mind and maybe, just maybe feel ready to tackle the night ahead of you, feel as though this is the time you finally turn things around. But no matter how hard you try, how hard you weep and bawl and try to get it all out, you’re still just a fuckup. No matter what you try, that knowledge is still there, gripping onto your every thought and reminding you that things are never going to change.

You’re not strong. You’re not a hero. You’re not even worthy of the name Katia Managan. You’re sad and angry and nothing makes sense, but you know this is probably the clearest your head is going to get.

Someday, things are going to get better. Someday, you are going to fight and persevere and everything will feel great. You think.But for now, you know what you have to do.

And at the very least, there is no way you could possibly make yourself feel any worse.

Katia, for the first time, manages to avoid drowning drinking. She overcomes her issues. And you know what happens next?

She accidentally sets the church on fire, because this is still Prequel. She passes out from smoke inhalation, and then there’s….

this, and then she wakes up and reflects on her managing to stay on the wagon.

Honestly, you just feel… kind of numb.

You fucked up. You lost everything you earned, were discarded by the people you looked up to most, gave away the package you were supposed to be delivering to pay your friend back, completely lost control of your powers, and after passing out naked in a church have probably ruined any chance you might have had at a good reputation in Kvatch. You were a wreck last night when this was all happening, but now… you guess it just feels like you’ve run out of sad. You’re just confused.

Personally, I think this stuff is way darker than anything that happens in the Homestuck Epilogues, which is mostly just over-the-top Warhammer 40k grimderp. This shit got to me, man. And around the time this is happening in the comic, I lost my job. And as the storyline continued past this point, I kept applying for jobs and getting turned down, and it started to really wear on me, I felt I had no useful skills, since my old job was supporting software that only that company used because they made it. Much like Katia got into great positions only to fail, I walked out of interviews thinking I’d aced it only to get turned down, while Katia kept making two-steps-forward-one-step-back advances and not really getting any closer to solving any of her issues. And one day, about six weeks into joblessless and starting to get into serious depression over it, I got two “Thanks but no thanks” calls from places I was feeling good about back to back, and I was just done. 10am and I was going to go into my room and lie down on the floor all day but first Prequel updated so I guess I’ll check it real quick oh hey a flash

youtube

This puzzle took me like 20 tries, I’m no good at them. Aggy ran out of inspiring dialogue and started looping. And if you’re not in the right mindset, in the right place, this probably doesn’t seem like much. But right there, a month and a half into unemployment, doing that stupid fucking jumping jumpy peg thing while a ghost cheered me on was life-changing. I was so fucking jazzed when I got it, I was fired up! I was so fired up I tabled my “lie on the floor all day in despair” plan, and started applying for a bunch of jobs. A few of those jobs called me back. One hired me. I still work there now. I always liked webcomics but Aggy Extrapolate is the reason I make them. Because good art is powerful. Good art changes lives, maybe even saves them. And it doesn’t need to be happy to do it, Katia still hasn’t succeeded at her goals (in part because Prequel updates at a rate Dresden Codak would make fun of).

What the hell did the Homestuck Epilogues do, by comparison? What’s the positive net effect on my life, or my interaction with art? “Sometimes things you like are bad”? Shit, man, I already knew that, I’m into wrestling. How is “John recognizes Terezi’s jizz on his dad’s car” supposed to make me a better person, exactly? Do you really think the problem with fandoms is that they’re not angry enough? Are you high, Andrew Hussie?

#Homestuck #Prequel #Prequel Adventure #Also Drop Out was a million times better than the epilogues while also being a million times darker #Anonymous

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itsclydebitches · 5 years ago

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RWBY Recaps: The Greatest Kingdom

Hello, glorious RWBY fandom! It’s that time of the year again. No, not the holidays. Rather, it’s the roughly twelve weeks where my Saturdays are lost to the void of churning out 4,000+ words of typo-laden analysis for our favorite web-series. Does that sound like a good time? If so, stick around and keep reading.

Now, those of you who joined us last year will recall that I took issue with numerous aspects of Volume Six. Many of you are capable of summarizing these aspects in great detail considering that the conversation never stopped on my blog between January 26th and, well, today. But for those of you who don’t otherwise suffer my metas or who might be joining us for the first time, here’s a very short guide to the stuff we’ve been chatting about the last few months:

Holy shit they really went all in on dragging Ozpin, huh?

Is the group part of a collective consciousness now? What happened to diverse thinking?

Should un-licensed teenagers steal military property and start grimm-drawing battles with national allies? No or double no?

We hate adults? Is that really a thing?

When will Oscar’s on-screen development come back from the war?

There are numerous, numerous other connected topics, from Rooster Teeth’s handling of physical assault all the way to theories regarding the relic’s potential influence and Jinn’s motives, but that’s the basic gist. Oh, and we now have a subset of the fandom who got big mad over fans headcanoning trans!Nora based on her new color scheme. ... So that’s where we’re starting this volume off.

Just so we’re all on the same page:

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Anyhoo, with that bare-bones context out of the way, let’s dive in.

We begin, as usual, with a shot of the shattered moon. Except this is the first volume where we know precisely what happened to it and all it may mean for humanity. It lends a certain amount of gravitas to our start. Now, rather than the more generic, “Ah. Right. That motif. Still a mystery, huh?” shots of the moon function as a quick reminder of the group’s new stakes. 99% of the time the focus is on Salem and our heroes’ attempts to keep this genocidal dictator from destroying and/or enslaving the entire world, but “The Lost Fable” set up that the true, end-game antagonists have always been the gods. Even if Salem is destroyed, they still exist as a continued threat to humanity. If they wish to use the gods to help them in their quest against Salem, they likewise risk their judgment. Having introduced them, that’s a tricky problem the show is going to have to solve before its end.

For now though we pan down to the Atlas military, numerous ships and lots of chatter over the radio setting up precisely how massive, organized, and deadly this army is. I would like to remind everyone that this is what the group deliberately decided to piss off by not merely stealing an airship, but unnecessarily attacking the head special operative of the Argus base. The fact that the military has grown more “aggressive” in Weiss’ absence has no bearing on her original knowledge that stealing/attacking this group would be a horrendous idea. She knew it. Qrow knew it. Everyone ignored that in favor of Jaune’s idiotic plan. I bring this up not to rub more salt in a long open wound, but to re-establish how the group is, thus far, unable to think ahead and accurately weigh the consequences of their actions. More on that later.

Their ship, Manta 5-1, is welcomed home and instructed to land so that a security team can debrief them. Whoops. Jaune, again in his infinite wisdom, reminds everyone that they achieved their goal of getting to Atlas. So now they just need to find some answers, yeah? Not quite. Weiss immediately points out that landing with a stolen ship means that security won’t let them anywhere near Ironwood… which, again, is something that holds true regardless of whether the military got more aggressive and their leader more dictator-y. This is not new information. Oddly enough, a group of teenagers with only one licensed huntsmen among them (considering that Maria is presumably still keeping a low profile) flying a stolen airship doesn’t exactly breed the sort of confidence that lets anyone---paranoid or not---approach a leader. These were all issues from the start that the group didn’t bother to consider in their haste to finish this mission.

“They might even take me back to my father,” Weiss says. Another concern that they’re only realizing now, yet one that the fandom latched onto immediately. Though mostly in the wrong way. It’s because Jacques is a threat that they should have found a more covert way into Atlas, or waited to hear from Ironwood, or just send Weiss herself with Cordovin’s blessing… Yes, much of the fandom got quite defensive at that suggestion, claiming that sending Weiss “alone” (she never would have been alone. Bird uncle. Fits into a suitcase grandma) was tantamount to handing her to Jacques wrapped up in a bow. Except, as is made perfectly clear here, it’s their illegal activity that endangers them. Which is more likely to get you sent off to daddy? Acting like a child by stealing military property and then getting caught? Or entering Atlas as a huntress with a special operative’s blessing, carrying instructions that you are to meet with Ironwood as soon as possible? To say the team dropped the ball on this one is an understatement.

Those, however, are all past options now far out of reach. Weiss decides then that she’ll simply call Winter and I absolutely adore Kara’s voice acting here. She managed to imbue so much into a single name, conveying Weiss’ realization, hope, and love for her sister in just two quick syllables. I feel like I got more insight into Weiss through that moment alone then the entirety of Volume Six. Only problem? Blake notices another feed where a recording of Winter emphasizes that anyone found breaking Atlas law will face punishment---something our group will be quite familiar with by the end of the episode---and Qrow decides that they probably shouldn’t go charging into Winter and Ironwood’s hands until they know more about the situation.

Which is the smartest decision we’ve seen in a while, considering that Ironwood’s own feed leaves little to the imagination. He continues to sport that beard, giving him more of a disheveled appearance compared to Volumes 1-3. His voice is as authoritative as ever and he literally towers high above all the people he’s supposedly protecting, keeping his distance from both the city and the airships that ‘govern’ it. A few moments earlier we got to see the startling contrast between the military life and the civilians’. Warm reds and browns give (in this case a literal) down-to-Earth feel and the neon signs are easy markers of a low-class neighborhood. You know the stereotyped kind: cheap food and cheaper entertainment. Compared to the whites and blues of the Atlas clouds, paralleling their elite (and thereby expensive) technology, the city below feels like a slum in comparison, reinforced by the dirty, drunk, and at times violent background characters that populate it.

As Maria says later, “A home in the clouds is as bright as it gets,” to which Nora responds, “Unless you’re the one having to look up at it,” something she’d be very familiar with as a child stealing bread in the otherwise plentiful looking Kuroyuri. There are contrasts in coloring, dialogue, as well as framing here. Compare Ironwood’s sky-high observation to Pietro’s existence as a black man, in a wheelchair, doing volunteer work in what’s established as a dump. He’s as “low” as he can possibly be and acknowledges that he prefers to actually be among the people, not standing literally or figuratively above them. Just in case the audience misses these cues, we get some rather ominous music on top of all that and fearful looks between Ruby and Yang.

Ironwood’s recording says that some people may view these as “uncertain times,” likewise contrasting Glynda’s recording in the very first episode, announcing that they live in an “extraordinary time of peace.” Whether there’s uncertainty or not, Ironwood promises that Atlas will remain “safe and strong,” even if the other Kingdoms have begun to falter. The speech has a very ‘Us vs. Them’ quality about it.

“He looks tired,” Ruby comments and I just need to chuck another fandom into the mix real quick because:

Under these circumstances, “tired” doesn’t just require the John Mulaney advice of, “Get some rest, tall child!” It’s a clear dig at the leader’s capabilities and even their mental faculties. “James… what have you been doing?” Qrow asks, thereby re-framing “tired” as the nice euphemism for “gone off the deep end.” It remains to be seen though precisely how much of Ironwood’s paranoia is literal paranoia in the sense that it’s illogical and undeserved, and how much of these changes are highly undesirable, but potentially justifiable decisions. After all, we as the audience know precisely how dangerous Salem and her crew are. We know why Beacon fell. We’re privy to the stakes in a way that the average, angry Atlas citizen is not. All Ironwood can do in the face of such odds is try to prepare for every eventuality… it just looks like he’s reached a point where those preparations have started infringing on basic human rights. It’s a very sad setup. A classic case of the wrong things done for the right reasons.

There’s a check-in from the radio tower, whoever’s in charge wondering why Manta 1-5 hasn’t gone towards their landing pad yet. Maria comments that the lady should take a hint and starts finding a different place to land. Which in hindsight is kind of funny because they obviously did take a hint… and then sent out a special team to deal with the implications of that hint.

As the group starts exploring we get a lovely shot demonstrating how much they stand out in this new environment.

Though there’s some color in the neon signs, the otherwise overwhelming brown/beige/black/red makes elements like Nora’s pink skirt and Weiss’ white hair stick out like sore thumbs. As we’ll see in a minute, there are obviously in-world difficulties with them passing as average citizens, but it’s also a signal to the audience that, for now at least, they’re really out of their depth. This is the “greatest kingdom” referenced in our title.

Maria is leading them to a friend of hers when a bot takes an interest in these obvious outsiders. It approaches Yang at the back of the group, takes an unexpected picture, and she responds by kicking it into the street where it sparks with damage before getting hit by a truck.

(Flashback to Ruby and Penny, anyone?)

Now, I’m honestly on the fence about this moment. You could make the case that they’re all traumatized fighters and responding to that flash was a logical, instinctual response. You can even argue that, just hours after taking her first faunus life, Yang is more than a little on edge—even though the premier doesn’t reference this incredibly significant event at all, outside of Blake’s quick realization that her blade is still broken. Both are valid and easily supported readings. However, I’m still hyper aware that this is Yang. The character who, for two volumes now, has been characterized very strongly by her, “attack first, ask questions later” attitude. Out of all the characters we could have seen instinctively attacking something that hadn’t actually done her any harm, choosing Yang holds the most weight. The story also lightly acknowledges that this was an extreme response, what with the group staring at her and Yang’s sheepish expression.

Whether it’s specifically in the context of trauma over the fight with Adam, or more broadly acknowledging Yang’s tendency to both assume and act on the worst in people, I hope this volume helps her manage these instincts. One talk with Tai about not punching through problems isn’t going to cut it. Especially when her forceful attitude has caused much of the internal conflict recently.

It’s after this that the group is accosted by a drunk man, functioning largely as exposition to explain what’s been going on in Atlas and why the people are so scared and angry about it. Pissed enough to get literally pissed, of the inebriated variety. Here then, we return to the “this group of teenagers is really bad at thinking ahead” issue that I mentioned earlier. Ruby is all ready to start a fight---referencing her newfound willingness to escalate situations that don’t necessitate escalation---and it’s Blake who holds her back, reminding Ruby that they can’t afford to cause a scene. Which is fantastic. Except they end up causing a scene anyway when the drunk calls Blake a “stupid faunus” and Weiss uses a glyph to chuck him into the trash.

Is seeing a racist asshole get his just desserts extremely satisfying? Absolutely and from a representation perspective I’m thrilled to see Rooster Teeth taking a hard stance in their story. From an in-world perspective though, that was an incredibly bad decision. We’ve been establishing since minute one of this premier that the group needs to be cautious. Blake herself, the victim here, just told Ruby not to endanger the whole group by defending her honor… and then Weiss swoops in to do it anyway. There are two priorities here, to your friends and to your mission, and the issue is that Team RWBY has a tendency to consistently prioritize the former, something that wouldn’t be an issue if this was still a low-key story about a group of students and not would-be, formal huntresses trying to save the world. The choice to attack rather than walking away---paralleling last volume’s final battle---speaks to their inability to think ahead and weigh their priorities. “It was worth it,” Weiss says, but is it? Now that you’ve caused the scene that you couldn’t afford? Now that this guy recognized your glyphs and you’ve blown your cover? I realize I’ll probably get heat for this, but there’s a difference between calling out micro-aggressions in everyday life and calling them out when you’re fugitives trying to keep an invaluable relic safe. It would have said more about the group’s maturity if Blake had succeeded in avoiding a scene and they expressed anger/sympathy among themselves that she had to put up with that shit. Throwing guys into dumpsters is satisfying as hell, but it’s not the action of a level-headed adult conducting a job.

Provided that the story actually acknowledges how young they are and that it’s expected they make such mistakes, we’re golden. As it is though, these issues are usually brushed aside. Later Maria says that Pietro “likes to keep a low profile. Something I’m coming to realize you know nothing about,” but it’s said in a joking, fond manner. This isn’t treated as an actual flaw and is therefore not set up as something for the team to work on. And that, right there, is the heart of the conflict between RWBYJNR and Ozpin. He’s a fine scalpel. They’re a sledgehammer. RWBY continually introduces threats that require a delicate touch---whether it’s the possibility of spies in your midst that force you to carefully monitor who has what information, or needing to move through a city without drawing attention to yourself---these battles require a certain level of strategy and without fail our heroes are characterized as people who can only solve their problems through direct, immediate violence. You don’t walk away from a fight. Ever. Be it Cordovin or a racist drunk. The more I see of their behavior, no matter the good intentions behind it, the more it makes sense to me that Ozpin lied and kept his secrets. Our heroes simply don’t have the patient, level-headed, forward-thinking personalities required to fight this kind of delicate war. Their talent lies in the hack-’em slash-’em situations.

Anyway, I’m getting off topic. The group runs from the guards that show up after the drunk guy incident and they manage to make it to Pietro’s place. After some fun dialogue about whether he remembers Maria and the state of his shop, we get a potential explanation for Maria’s strange behavior on the train. Everyone remember this?

Obviously the camera focusing on Maria helps us, the audience, realize that she’s a character who will eventually become important to the story, but it’s also a bit coincidental that she’s hanging out near Team RWBY’s room. Especially when she inexplicably ends up on the back half of the train when everyone else was evacuated. It was clear at the time that she’d deliberately stayed back, but to what purpose no one was sure. Here, Maria gives a general answer about how she thought this group might have needed her guidance while fighting all those manticores… which is still an odd explanation to my mind. Because up until her confession leaving the farmhouse, Maria wants to keep that low-profile. She’s done with being the Grimm Reaper, so why get involved now? Especially when, with hired huntsmen to protect the train and a large group of teens with their own weapons, she probably would have assumed they were all in good hands? Even if it was just a fighter’s natural instinct to help, what would that guidance have looked like? Pretending to be a normal, formal huntress lending a hand where she can? Admitting she’s the Grimm Reaper? Is she still able to fight? There’s still the highly coincidental nature that Maria, the greatest huntress of a generation, just happened to be traveling the same route as and randomly became interested in the group involved with Salem, gods, and the relics.

To be clear, I’m not really arguing that there’s some big conspiracy surrounding Maria. Coincidences are common in all fiction because if things happened based on real-life probability, it would all be pretty boring. Rather, I’m simply pointing out that between losing her eyes as a young adult and coincidentally getting involved with Team RWBY now, we pretty much have no idea what Maria has been up to for most of her life. If the story wanted to establish some sort of betrayal/trickery/what-have-you, there’s room for it.

That would make me super sad though. I quite like Maria.

We learn more about Ironwood’s increasing paranoia, a hint that not everyone on the council is happy with his changes---that mysterious woman we keep seeing on the posters, perhaps?---and the acknowledgement that whoever helped bring down Atlas’ tech at Beacon has to be “Either a genius, or one of our own.” Probably both. Enter Watts, seen typing at a computer in our opening.

With all this info bearing down on them, a few characters like Jaune and Oscar start asking whether they can just leave and yes, please tackle that, because it’s a very important question. Right now the show has stalled the, “Will the group continue the fight against Salem and what’s their reasoning for doing so when they all think it’s pointless?” question by throwing up another roadblock with the relic. They got it to Atlas, but they’re not sure they can hand it off to Ironwood yet, which just leaves them twiddling their thumbs. That portion of the quest isn’t technically complete yet, putting off an answer as to whether and why they’ll go onto the next portion. We need to tackle the group’s new motivations though. Soon. I sincerely hope that when Ironwood announces he has a way of defeating Salem, we finally get the group challenging their own assertions that such attempts are fundamentally useless. We had a whole volume of, “Oh no. Oh god. Salem is immortal and all our work is for naught.” We need at least a little attention paid to the development of a new perspective to counteract that.

Before things can get too bleak though, Pietro recognizes Weiss as a Schnee. Yang, in a lovely moment of support, desperately tries to re-direct the conversation back to the council. Pietro then recognizes her arm, puts it all together to get Team RWBY, and drops the loaded comment, “My daughter has told me so much about you.”

Many fans saw it coming. Even more hoped for it. Honestly? I think that’s great. Too many shows nowadays rely on “twists” that don’t actually make sense, or even undermine the original setup. Those are frustrating beyond belief and feel like the authors are selling out good story for cheap, undesired shock value. The fandom saw Penny’s resurrection coming a mile away? Great! That just means Rooster Teeth did a good job of setting up that possibility and then following through on it.

I’ll talk more about Penny’s introduction in a moment, but first I just want to throw out that I legitimately enjoyed the fight scene. Good action and creative teamwork at times. I particularly liked Weiss and Ren working together to take down four grimm in as many seconds. Oscar likewise takes a grimm out with a very impressive strike… more impressive than I was expecting from him, honestly. Right now I suppose I’m just inclined to shrug that off with, “He and Ozpin are slowly merging, so he picks up stuff way faster than everyone else,” most notably Jaune. Also, I’ll be blunt. I wouldn’t touch canon-based rosegarden with a ten-foot pole. You know, because of all the issues like a massive age difference, two minor characters involved, questions of consent, the fact that Ruby was Ozpin’s student---pesky ethical concerns like that. AUs though? I think the ship is adorable. Provided that Oscar is fully his own person and there’s consent on both sides appropriate for whatever ages they currently are in your fic or fanart? Very nice. So, it’s for those fans that I point out an entirely coincidental parallel: Ruby saves Oscar from a grimm with a bullet in nearly the exact same manner that Blake saves Yang from a grimm with a bullet. Make of that what you will.

Back to Penny though. Overall, am I thrilled that she’s back? Absolutely. I actually spoke about this recently while answering an ask, expressing how much I’d enjoy this very scenario: having her consciousness saved and thus allowing for her resurrection. Do I think her new look is adorable? Yes, yes I do. “And yet,” you say, “It sounds like there’s a ‘but’ somewhere in there, Clyde.” Yeah. Sadly there is. Because although I’m happy to have Penny, I wasn’t particularly taken with how they re-introduced her.

Simply put, there was far too much humor for what should have been a touching, emotional scene. With the exception of one moment where Ruby tries to voice the word “killed,” everyone treats Penny’s resurrection as a surprising, but not terribly notable event. Yang, Weiss, and Blake express a sort of long-suffering fondness as they comment on how wholesome this is. Pietro laughs at any shock over her “death” and shrugs about how yeah, it technically was. Whatever. Qrow takes the time to nonchalantly say that things are going better than he expected. Ruby is holding it all together with barely a blink. Penny herself is nothing but exuberance and funny dialogue. Maria cracks a joke about how she has no idea who this child is. Jaune goes, “Well, that was unexpected” as if Penny had showed up in Atlas when they all thought she was in Vacuo. That sort of surprise. The whole thing is treated flippantly with, “Never a dull moment.” Summarized, all this really isn’t the appropriate reaction to realizing a friend is no longer dead.

Yes, Ruby was the closest to Penny by far---we can’t expect everyone to get misty-eyed---but does everyone remember what her death was like? It was the turning point of the entire series, not just for the audience, but the characters as well. Penny was the first casualty of the Fall of Beacon and her death was appropriately gut wrenching. It was then shown across every TV turned to the Vytal Festival, the moment where the whole world watched their golden girl, Pyrrha, unintentionally murder a newcomer who turned out to be a robot. Moments later grimm start attacking and the safest place on Remnant is destroyed. Penny’s death heralded all that. The one time we see Ruby tackling the trauma of it all is when she speaks with Oscar and, notably, crumbles a bit when she instinctively uses Penny’s catch phrase.

What I had hoped for was the group grappling with the sudden, completely unexpected shock of getting one of two losses back; working through the knowledge that their lives have been defined by two friends’ death and now one of those has been retroactively erased. Perhaps we’ll see that in future episodes, but right now it feels like a disservice to the impact Penny’s death had on the characters and the story to treat this as such a comic, light-hearted moment. Let Penny tackle-hug Ruby and then let Ruby give her a much more sincere embrace. Let her cry. Have Yang put a hand on Ruby’s shoulder, giving her a look that expresses how she understands what this means to her. Have Jaune looking away, devastated that Ruby miraculously got her friend back, but such an event is impossible for Pyrrha. Let him or Oscar or Ren or anyone seriously acknowledge that, holy shit, this is a joyous occasion we never expected to experience. We’ve spent months dealing with trauma and pessimism, now here’s Penny, reminding us that there’s still so much good in the world. Have someone acknowledge that sometimes the impossible happens (cough-defeatingSalem-cough). You can allow the moment to function as the momentous occasion it is and then lighten the mood by having Maria announce that she has no idea what’s going on.

This isn’t the first time Rooster Teeth has implemented comedy when they were better off sticking with drama. See: the choice to animate punching Ozpin last volume in an absurd, cartoon style. So yeah. Happy to have Penny back, but that first moment felt underwhelming, to say the least.

We then have an admittedly very cool shot—

— (semblance? Just awesome drama?) right before the group is taken out in seconds by Atlas’ elite. They’re… I don’t know how to spell their name yet. Is it something like Ace-Ops for elite special operations? Or Aesop like Aesop’s fables? Potentially both? Idk. The fandom will figure that out in the next day or so, if they haven’t already. What’s important though is that this group charges our team with stealing an airship, illegally entering the city with it, and starting an unauthorized fight in the streets. If I could just take one second to…

Ahem. I’m good. Seriously though, if I’m at all optimistic for Volume Seven it’s because the story is finally acknowledging that the group made some pretty massive mistakes last volume. Not that it looks like there will be much punishment attached to that. Between them meeting with Ironwood in the trailer and the Blah-Blah-Ops’ clear status as heroes this volume (they’re in the opening a bunch and seem to be working with RWBYJNR), I’m not yet convinced that this arrest will lead to anything other than getting precisely what they want: seeing Ironwood. To be clear, it’s not like I want the group languishing in jail for twelve episodes. That would be one hell of a boring volume. But rather, I’m interested in whether the story will continue to imply that Atlas is in the right for arresting them, or whether Episode Two will quickly turn that on its head and forcefully announce, as they did in Volume Six, that these actions are an egregious insult because we’re the protagonists. How dare you not let us do whatever we want?

Because the group was in the wrong here. It can be easy to miss considering that the rules they’re refusing to obey are tied up in a dictator-like society---aren’t we the heroes for ignoring and circumventing evil Ironwood’s laws?---but what they actually choose to do has far more of an impact on innocent civilians than it does on The Man. Like endangering all of Argus with your needless battle. Or, to a much smaller extent here, jumping into a fight when you’re not authorized to do that. Now, I actually don’t blame RWBYJNR for that one. They are huntsmen and it’s their job to protect the people. Going out to defeat grimm is 100% their thing. Rather, I’m talking about stuff like their commentary on Atlas’ defenses. When the fight starts we get, “I guess the city’s defenses aren’t doing much” and “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.” It’s more of that, “Us huntsmen are the only true defenders of the world. Your attempts with robots would be funny if it weren’t so dangerous” attitude. It’s a certain level of arrogance. As we see just a minute later though, Ironwood’s setup works. Because the civilians all know to get indoors. Because he has Penny. The robots hold off the grimm until she arrives, defeating the rest with a speed and an ease that frankly doesn’t compare to what we saw the group accomplishing. She does from above what it took nine of them to manage, often (as we saw with Oscar and Yang) with great danger to them in the process. When they’re bound and accused of unauthorized fighting, it’s clear that they were, in fact, shouldering their way into a situation where they weren’t needed---and potentially causing trouble in the process. Rules exist for a reason. Are they always perfect? Far from it, but in the characterization folding over from Volume Six, the group has forgotten that most of the time rules are there for others’ safety. They have been thought out. This particular situation is easily defendable (of course they’re going to go fight grimm) and there were no consequences to the group jumping in when they weren’t allowed (like property damage or injured civilians), but this moment does function as a good representation of the overall problem. Just because there weren’t consequences for saying, “Screw your laws” this time doesn’t mean there won’t be in the future. Or that there hasn’t been in the past.

It likewise stands out to me that Qrow consistently tires to use his “I’m a licensed huntsmen” as a justification. He flashes it at the two goons on the train to get them to back off. He tires to use it to get past Cordovin. He now tells his captors that he has every right to fight and protect the people because of this card he carries. Qrow is well aware of how important the status of a huntsmen is in this world… yet he’s running around with eight fighters who don’t have that legal backing. I don’t think the show would ever go for my suggestion of another school arc so they could finish their training, but at the very least we should provide some sort of loop-hole for these characters. Have Ironwood provide special licenses based on their heroics at the Fall of Beacon and their work since. Because right now we have a world that’s continually emphasizing being a huntsmen as a job, something you earn the right to call yourself, yet 95% of our group doesn’t have that right in the eyes of their society. We know they’ve done great, secret work to protect the people. But the people only know that these are a bunch of teens with one year of formal training. So you really can’t blame any officials for going, “Sorry. We’re not in the habit of letting random people with weapons cross our borders. Or fight in our streets.” It’s like if a bunch of 14-18yos arrived at a crime scene with guns and demanded that they be let in on a case. No, we never graduated from an academy, but you should adhere to our demands anyway. The good intentions are there, but you need to iron out the formalities first.

Really, RWBY should just fix the whole license thing with a throw-away plot point if they’re not going to tackle it seriously, just so this isn’t an ethical issue anymore. I’d rather smooth it over soon since the story doesn’t seem interested in tackling whether a group with one year of formal training should be allowed that status. So just give it to them and let’s move on. They might still run into issues with Atlas, but at least the rest of the world won’t be expected to trust them purely on faith. Not everyone belongs to a small town terrorized by a geist, with four random teens as your only option for safety.

Which finally, as the doors close on our group with heavy heads, brings us to the opening. Some things to pay attention to:

1. We get a glimpse of that mysterious woman shown in numerous posters across the city.

(I’m likewise interested in the very long shot we got on this “show your teeth” graffiti.)

2. Watts and Tyrian are presented as primary antagonists. Interesting that Neo and Cinder aren’t there (not that I caught anyway), especially since we know they were heading to Atlas last volume as well. It makes me think that they’ll be the true threat at the end of the volume. Keeping things quiet, even in the intro, so we have no chance of guessing their plan.

3. The main conflict seems to be between Weiss and Winter, as opposed to Weiss and Jacques as many originally assumed. Those expressions don’t bode well.

4. We still see an image of Ironwood briefly flickering to Jacques though as an angry citizen throws a rock at it. Implying Jacques is secretly pulling the strings? James has simply become too much like him? We’ll have to see.

5. We get a shot of Oscar and Ironwood… training? Fighting? I’m inclined to say fighting based on his and Ozpin’s past difficulties, but that’s also up in the air.

6. The image of our staff…

…and 7. an absolutely massive cast this volume. As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’m concerned with RWBY’s insistence on continually introducing so many new characters, particularly characters who are important enough to warrant decent development. There simply isn’t time for them all.

(Although, is Maria in that shot? Wonder if she’ll leave the group now that she’s done her duty of helping Ruby out with her eyes.)

Which brings us to the end of the premier! Finally, I’d like to end with a personal note. As is quite obvious, I’m still watching and recapping RWBY, but I feel like I should be upfront about my overall lack of investment in the series right now. Chock it up to getting burned last volume, fading interest in a long-running show, just growing up and changing… I don’t claim to know precisely why I’m no longer jazzed about a new volume like I once was. But, if I perhaps appear overly critical of what I generally thought was a good—and honestly better than expected—premier? That’s probably why. The details just don’t cut it for me anymore. All caps, screaming excitement over Penny’s return or Qrow’s new outfit just doesn’t resonate much, which leaves me with a more critical perspective on the show overall. So if that’s something you’re interested in, stick around because, baring unforeseen circumstances, there will be more metas over the next three or so months. More invested in a flailing celebration of RWBY as a whole? You’re better off hitting up another blog.

Basically, you know that shot in Pietro’s?

Note the “Days since our last nonsense” sign combined with the defeated expressions. That’s what RWBY feels like to me these days. A lot of nonsense and limited enjoyment. Ah well. Maybe Volume Seven will prove me wrong and I’ll be re-invigorated by the end of the season!

Until then, ❤️️

Minor Things of Note

Maria refers to the group as “kids” in the airship and Penny as a “child.” Acknowledging last year’s debate, I stand by the argument that just because many (but not all) of the group have reached the age of maturity in our world doesn’t mean they’re on par with the adults they were so recently rejecting. There’s a reason why the very old Maria naturally uses “kid” and “child” and it doesn’t come off as weird.

I really like the design of Pietro’s chair. Giving him something that walks on four legs is both different and a nice nod to nature among all the tech. Also, kudos to the Pinocchio reference on his bookshelf in the form of a whale.

Nora remains as adorable as ever. I particularly liked her energy in Pietro’s and her high-key annoyance at Ren getting a jump on the fight. I’m interested in what we’ll be learning about her this volume.

Not sure I’m a fan of Rooster Teeth using these squeaky toy noises whenever the group is comically surprised by something. Comedy is great, we need it in this story, but sound effects like that are remnants (ha) of a tone we haven’t really seen since Volume 1. I think the show can still get away with exaggerated facial expressions---Nora in her excitement, Ruby laughing at Jaune’s Pumpkin Pete’s sweatshirt---but this feels a bit out of place now.

“Maybe Atlas isn’t as safe as we thought” and yet, astoundingly, no one is inclined to ask Ozpin to weigh in on this. Even now that they know he’s listening. I think I’ll start a tally. See how many episodes it takes to actually acknowledge, let alone act on, the primary conflict of Volume 6.

Image Credit

Personal screenshots from RWBY

Transflag: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Transgender_Pride_flag.svg

Doctor Who GIF: https://tenor.com/view/doctor-who-tired-harriet-jones-gif-5627138

How I Met Your Mother GIF: https://giphy.com/gifs/celebrate-2o5Ypf4fP6ahq

#rwby #rwby volume 7 #rwby volume 7 spoilers #mymetas #rwby recaps

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fanficsaremylifeline · 5 years ago

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Fandom: Captain America (Movies) Relationships: Rebecca Barnes Proctor & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes & Rebecca Barnes Proctor & Steve Rogers Summary:

Rebecca's calm life in the retirement home is turned upside down once more, when all of a sudden Steve, who to her recollection died about seventy years ago, stands in her room, here to make good on a promise he made to her 81 years ago.

***

“Ms Barnes?” After a soft knock, Nurse Moira poked her head through Rebecca's door.

“What is it, dear?” Rebecca looked over at the woman and put her book down.

“You have a visitor.”

“Oh, I thought Adelaide wasn't going to come around this week.”

“No, Ms Barnes, there is a charming young man here, who'd like to see you”, she smiled.

Huh. Rebecca was pretty sure that the only charming young men she knew, worked here at the nursing home. Well, except for Philip, her godson. Though it would be very unlikely for him to visit on a Wednesday morning.

Nurse Moira turned around, probably to the man in question and gestured at Becca's door.

“Thanks.” He stepped into the room. And Rebecca could not believe her eyes. “Hey Becca.”

“Oh, you gotta be kidding me!” With what was probably a new record time for her, she jumped up from her chair and dashed straight towards the visitor. “Steve? Is that really...” She cupped his face, pulled him a little down, so she could properly inspect who she was pretty sure was a) dead and b) six years older than her, even though the man standing in front of her didn't look older than thirty. “Is that really you?”

“Yeah”, he nodded with the widest smile. “I know it's weird, but it's me.”

“Oh my!” She wrapped her arms around him in a tight hug. “I missed you, so, so much!”

“I missed you, too.” Steve held her tight, leaning down just enough so he could rest his head on hers, while she pressed her face against his chest. It may have been 70 or so years, but Becca basked in the familiarity of his touch, his scent and her eyes filled with tears.

“Becca, you know damn well that if you start crying, so will I”, Steve laughed, but he was clearly choked up.

“Tough”, she sniffled, “that's just what you get for coming back from the dead.”

“Fair enough.”

Becca leaned back and looked up at him. “Steven Grant Rogers, you always were an impossible punk.”

“I think that's a compliment.”

“Yeah.” Without missing a beat, she boxed against his arm, as hard as she could.

“Ouch!”, he cried out, his face falling into offended confusion. “What was that for?”

“For dying after promising me you'll come back home! And this”, she hit his other arm, “is for you and Bucky needing to be self-sacrificing idiots!”

“I'm so sorry, I really am! We...”

“I'M NOT DONE YET! This”, she boxed against his stomach, “is for taking seventy years to come back.”

“Are you done?”

“One more. How DARE you look that good at 94?”

“That isn't actually my fault”, he defended himself, his arms raised up defensively.

Not that she had actually managed to hurt him; as fit as she was for her age, she was an old woman in her late eighties and Steve was – apparently still – in the prime of his life. Whatever Howard Stark had cooked up back then, it still worked wonders.

“Well, how about you and me go for a nice cup of coffee and you can tell me what the hell happened.”

Becca grabbed her purse and her walking stick and linked her free arm with Steve's.

“I don't suppose Mildred's is still open?”

“'Fraid not. But the one here in the park is just as good.”

After Steve had finished his story, Rebecca could only stare at him. “So, let me get this straight: you didn't actually die, you were just... deep-frozen?”

“Something like that. Don't ask me how they defrosted me, though; Bucky was always the science nerd.”

“Yeah... They didn't thaw my brother out with you by any chance?”

His smile dropped and he shook his head. “I'm sorry.”

“Not your fault.” She put on a smile, but Steve saw how much it pained her, and he got it. He felt just the same. Not exactly the same, to him all that was only weeks ago, not seventy years... “Besides”, she added, “I have made my peace with that. With losing you as well. Thank you, for that very unnecessary heartbreak.”

“I can't tell you how sorry I am.”

“I know you are. I know my Stevie after all”, she added with a grin.

“Yeah, you do. So, tell me about your life! What happened to you? Did you become a lawyer?”

“I did”, she smiled proudly, “eventually. I didn't get into a lawschool until '61, I tell you, it was a lot of work and fights to get through. But it was definitely worth it, I was one hell of an attorney.”

“I don't have any doubts, because you, my dear, are fierce.”

“You have no idea...”

“Oh, yeah I do”, Steve laughed, “I have been on the receiving end of your fierceness plenty of times.” She could get down right scary; almost as much as Steve's Mum.

“Well, you deserved it every time. I didn't get married. I don't feel like I missed out on anything though, all my nieces and god-children were enough for me.”

“Oh wow. Lizzie, Ruth... Are they...”

“No”, she shook her head, “you missed Lizzie by about four years. Ruthie, she… she got sick, just after the war ended.”

“Oh.” Steve’s heart just broke into a million pieces. The Barnes-girls were like sisters to him, and knowing he’d really never see the two again really hurt.

“Yeah... Lizzie did the whole housewife thing though, got married, has two amazing daughters, Jamie and Stephanie. Can you guess after whom they are named?”

“She named her daughters after us?” Oh, Steve felt his eyes starting to sting and filling with tears. This was so bizarre yet so amazing!

“Yeah. Jamie is 57, works in Seattle at an advertising firm, she has two sons, Richard and Martin, wonderful boys, both in college at the moment, Richard doing IT and Martin becoming a teacher. Stephanie is 55, lives in Washington, she studied politics and works actually in the White House. Being named after Captain America probably helped with that”, she giggled. “Anyways, she has a daughter, Melissa, who works at a publishers, and she is going to be married soon!”

“Wow.” So much information about so many people Steve should know but didn't. “I can't wait to meet them”, he just smiled.

“They'll be ecstatic to meet you too, Uncle Steve.”

He couldn't keep the snorted laugh in anymore. “Uncle Steve?” That sounded somehow weirdly nice, yet all kinds of wrong at the same time.

“That's you, believe it or not.”

“It is not the most improbable thing that happened in the last few weeks… So, Lizzie’s husband… Do I know him?”

“You do”, she grinned, “on the third of April 1954, she became Mrs George Davis.”

“No.” Steve’s jaw hit the ground. “She married little Georgie? Seriously?” Little Georgie… He lived just down the street, was a year or two under Steve and Buck, and an adorable fellow. “Buck always assumed that he was gay.”

“He wasn’t. Steve, you should have seen him, he was one hell of a guy, protective of Lizzie and the girls like you wouldn’t believe and such a wonderful father… A guy like George I might have married”, she smiled. “But that guy, who promised to make an honest woman out of me if we both were still single by 35 just had to dive an airplane into the ocean, didn't he?”

“Oh my”, Steve laughed, “I did promise that, didn’t I?” After he caught his breath again, he smiled over at her. “Well, I can’t help but notice that we are both over 35 and still single…”

“Steven Grant Rogers.” He braced himself for being cussed at for such a ridiculous comment, when she raised her eyebrow. “If you think that this counts as a proposal you are sorely mistaken.”

“Wait, what?” His eyes went big as he tried to comprehend what she just insinuated.

“I might be a badass lawyer, but I’m also a romantic woman”, she continued, keeping their eyes locked. “So, until you go down on one knee, don’t expect me to even consider it.”

Huh. “Alright…” He cleared his throat and took a deep breath before smiling at her again. “Duly noted.”

“Good. Then, how about you escort me back to the home? I should be back for lunch.”

“Of course, my lady.” Steve got up and held his arm out to her and together they walked back through the garden to the home’s dining room, where they were greeted by some curious looks.

“My, Rebecca, who’s your friend?”, one lady asked, looking Steve up and down, which only made him a tad uncomfortable.

“That’s Steve”, she explained as he helped her into her chair. “You could say I’ve known him my whole life.”

Steve came by almost every day. He was offered a small apartment in Brooklyn, only a few streets from where she lived; it was like back when they were young. With the difference, that them meeting went over a lot calmer and quieter; they mostly spend their days out in the park or in her room, talking, catching up.

“So, my dear”, Steve smiled, as they sat out on a bench on lovely Tuesday afternoon, enjoying the sun beaming down on them, “I have made a promise to you, a long time ago. And well, I am a man of my word.” He searched his pocket and got up, before kneeling in front of her and holding out a simple silver band with a red gem on top.

Rebecca was speechless, which was quite the unusual feeling for her, as Steve took her hand. “Rebecca Dorothy Barnes, would you do me the honours of becoming Mrs Rebecca Dorothy Rogers?”

“Steve… you punk are impossible”, she smiled and nodded happily. “Yes, I would love for you to become Steven Grant Barnes.”

With a laugh he put the perfectly fitting ring on her finger and nuzzled into an embrace.

“If Bucky could see us now”, she laughed, “he’d be so jealous!” She grabbed his hand and squeezed it gently. “I always assumed he’d be the one Barnes you’d put a ring on.”

“Yeah…” Steve softly stroked her hand. “Wait.” He stilled suddenly, turning to her with wide eyes. “You… You knew?”

“Of course I do”, she chuckled, “I know my two idiots after all.” She looked up at him with an encouraging smile. “I don’t know when it happened that your friendship turned into more, and I also don’t know if you two ever were together, but know that I support you.”

“Thanks”, he sighed, clearly relieved.

“At least you're gonne be a Barnes, one way or another.”

“Well, first of all, I was under the impression I became an official Barnes the day Buck adopted me in... fourth grade I think it was. But more importantly, you are not some leftover, because I can't marry your brother. I could not wish for a more awesome, fierce and beautiful bride.”

“Aw, Stevie”, she cooed and, to keep from blushing too much, she cupped his face and put a soft kiss on his forehead.

“Besides, you'll look so much more lovely in a wedding dress than Buck ever could.”

The visits became a little unregularly, once Steve became an Avenger. And here Rebecca was, thinking her worrying about that boy had ended with the second world war, but no, he was back in uniform, fighting aliens and so many more unimaginable things.

“You are my fiancé”, she scolded him, “I do not appreciate you putting me through this torture again!”

“I know. It’s my job, though.”

“Doesn’t mean I have to like it.” Softly, she stroked the bruise on his face.

“At least we won.” Steve offered her a shy smile and damnit, that just got her every time. “Fine. You are forgiven.”

“Phew…”, he grinned. “And I promise to do my best to always come back, alright?”

“You made that promise once before”, she reminded him of the last time they had seen each other, back in the forties.

“And I kept it, didn't I?” With a skew grin he tried to mask the pain of his memories, but Rebecca knew him well enough to see right through it.

“This time 'round I might not have 70 years to wait for you anymore”, she just shrugged and went to inspect his bruised and battered arm. Sure, some of this country's best doctors had taken care of Steve, but she was damned if she didn't properly look after her fiancé.

“Never say nev... OUCH!”, he cried out, when she got a little too close to a particularly bad bruise.

“Wuss”, she just scoffed. It did look extremely painful though. Whatever those Alien-robots had been doing to the Avengers, it was effective. As aware as she had been all these years, in this moment she knew it more so than ever before: she couldn't live through mourning him a second time. “Promise me something else”, she asked of him.

“Anything.”

“Promise me not to die again. I don't care if you come back again or not, but do not make me mourn you, not one more damn time. You got that?”

“Yes”, he nodded and squeezed her hands. “I promise.”

“Hey Becca.” Steve put his head through her door and smiled at his fiancée.

“Steve”, she sighed and waved him over. “Come on in.”

He stayed in the door. “I have a surprise for you.”

“Are you finally marrying me?” Not that they were ever going to be married. It was however one of the greatest joys of her last few years and months, to have their fun with a promise they had long outlived.

“Better.” He opened the door wider and pulled someone in after him. All she could see at first was long, brown hair; when it was brushed away, her heart skipped a beat. “Wha…”

“Hey Becca”, her brother smiled and after a push from Steve, he walked over to her bed.

“James? Is that…” With all the strength she had left, she pushed herself up, Bucky holding out a hand, helping her sit up.

“Yeah”, he smiled and immediately the siblings were in a tight hug. “I missed you.”

“I missed you more”, she cried, holding tight onto him out of fear he’d disappear again if she let go.

Eventually, they did break apart; his face just as tearstained as hers; from the corner of her eye she saw Steve wiping the tears off his cheek.

“I love you, James.”

“I love you more.” He took her hands in his and softly kissed them; until his eye fell on the ring on her finger. “Hold up.” He straightened himself out and looked from Becca to Steve, back to his sister. “Steve told me about Ruthie, about Lizzie, but he never mentioned you being married… Please tell me you didn’t marry Arthur Thompson.”

Yup, there was her big brother, protective of Becca and the guys courting her. “I did not”, she clarified and smiled at Steve. “So, you didn’t tell him. Interesting.”

“Didn't tell me what?”

Steve turned a few shades redder and cautiously walked over, sitting himself besides the siblings. “Well...”

Buck held his hand up to shush Steve and turned back to Becca, who couldn't suppress the wide grin any more. “Seriously?”

“Back in the day he promised to marry me if I were still single by 35. I was still single by 88, so, being a man of his word, he proposed to me.”

After a short moment of silence, James just burst out laughing. Until now, Becca hadn't even realized how much she'd missed that sound and was happier than she ever thought she could be that she got to hear it again. “You guys are impossible... Did you get married?”

“Unfortunately, Captain America over there was too busy saving the world”, she commented with a roll of her eyes.

“Of course...”, he scoffed before turning towards Steve. “You better do right by my sister or I'll go all Winter Soldier on your pretty behind.”

“What's Winter Soldier?”

The way both Steve and James' faces dropped at her question, left her to be sure that it was nothing good.

“Nothing you need to worry about”, Steve smiled. “But Buck is right. I made a promise that I'd like to keep. What do you say, doll?”

“That I am not the one to make an honest man of you”, she answered with a warm smile. Steve and Bucky always were the dream team. And now that fate had given them a second chance, it was not on her to stand in their way.

“You met somebody else?” With wide eyes, James turned back to Steve. “Are you cheating on my little sister?”

“Of course not!”, he defended himself, “I would never!”

“I should hope so”, Buck grumbled and turned back to Becca. He took her hands back in his and softly brushed his thumb over her fingers. “I know that punk over there didn't ask me, but you two would have my blessing.”

“Aw, sweetheart!”, Becca smiled and pulled him into a hug. “And you two have mine”, she whispered into his ear. By the way he jumped, it was probably not what he had expected to hear from her.

“What?”, he choked out with wide, unblinking eyes.

“You heard me.”

“Heard what?” A little confused, Steve looked between the two of them.

“Nothing”, Bucky was quick to answer, blushing just enough for Becca to know that the past eighty years didn't change too much.

She smiled up at Bucky. “Just hurry, I'd like to see you get it sorted out and I don't think I have too much time left.”

“No, please don't say that! I just came back!” The insinuation about Buck and Steve's relationship was forgotten, as the tears filled his eyes once more.

“It's only fair. I had to mourn you, too.”

“Yeah, but you're stronger than me and Stevie put together...”

“Now that's some bull”, she laughed and took Steve's hand in her free one. “You two are gonna be fine. You got each other and that got you through the war, it'll get you through living in the 21st century.” Looking from one of her boys to the other, both with tears in their eyes, she got emotional as well. “Stop crying, you two. You know that when you cry, I'll start as well.”

“Sorry”, Steve chuckled and wiped his eyes.

“I'm not”, Buck made clear. “I love my pain-in-the-ass little sister.”

“I should hope so”, Becca laughed and, with the boys' help, she lay back in her bed. All that excitement was just a little too much, and maybe a nap would do her good.

She wasn't afraid to close her eyes, either; her two boys barely left her side and whenever she woke up they sat next to her. With Steve's celebrity status, nobody made too many problems for them ignoring all rules of visitation hours. They even stopped going on missions and as little as she would want to keep either from doing their jobs, Becca was eternally grateful not having to worry about them.

It took about two weeks for the boys to get their heads out of their asses and finally admit to the other how they felt and walked into her room hand in hand.

“Please tell me this means what I hope it means”, she sighed.

“Yeah, it does”, Buck grinned, his cheeks flushing a bit and looking over at Steve who had the biggest heart eyes.

“Finally”, Becca smiled. “Now I can die in peace.”

#rebecca barnes #steve rogers #captain america #bucky barnes #winter soldier #stucky

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wackygoofball · 5 years ago

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Gwenspiration: The Wacky Version Vol. 1 - The Fanfics

As threatened/promised, I am tooting the horn in a number of posts, following the most kind call of @jaimebrienneonline.

I decided to begin with fanfic as JB fanfiction was my way into the fandom when a kind voice, long time ago, lured me over to the wonderful world which is JBO. And ever since that day I found both my home and my people.

I am not going in a particular order because like my non-existent children, I kind of love and love to hate all of my fics equally.

But, for matters of scrolling convenience, I will put this list below a cut:

Childhood Friends has a special place in my heart because it is one of the two fics that got me into the fandom, and it is of the rare species of completed Wacky WIPs. The story marked my first tender steps in the canon as I was still catching up on show and book knowledge but got instantly hooked on the JB dynamic and just *had* to write fanfiction about them, albeit not yet knowing just what the frack Westeros even looked like on a map. I simply was intrigued by the idea of how the lives of our OTP may have played out differently if only they had met at a younger age, only to run into one another time and time again over the years, until at last, the circumstances seem to be in their favor. Writing that fic was a challenge because, for one, it got finished, which is incredibly hard for me to to do, and it is a coming of age story of sorts, which is not necessarily what I am used to writing. Nonetheless, it was a project that got me firmly into the fandom, which is why I am always remembering the process (and the writer’s panic) somewhat fondly, and always smile like an idiot when someone finds that old fic of mine and leaves a kudo or even a comment, reminding me of those early beginnings of my JB shipping career.

Choices likely has to be mentioned in the same vein, despite its crucial difference being that it went on a very, very, veeeeeery long hiatus and yet has to awaken (some prince wanting to give it a smooch to maybe bring it back to life? Would be much appreciated!). It was born out of the wish of exploring the infamous what if of Jaime and Brienne already getting intimate while on the road back to King’s Landing - as a matter of necessity/convenience, only for the misfortunate/very fortunate circumstance that Brienne winds up pregnant after their one time together. I enjoyed/would very much to enjoy again to write the character studies on how they deal not just with the issue of parenthood but also with their insecurities regarding their feelings for one another, which inspires more than one ill-made choice (*roll credits*) for either one of them as neither one dares to call love what actually is just that, hiding instead behind missions and honor, parenthood and duty, and fractured pasts that leave them wondering just who they became thanks to each other.

Colour Verses is a series that was born out of my first ever (I believe) JB Appreciation Week. OMG, it’s been so long. The theme of colors really had me inspired, which is why those pieces, which can be read in succession and independently, have a soft spot in my Wacky heart.

The Shredding Project, I believe, deserves an honorary mention despite its utter lack of completion for some of its parts and a happy ending for some of the tales shredded in this part of the fandom. I have a great passion for fairytales and deconstructing them, which inspired this undertaking of twisting and turning aka shredding all those stories into new models to fit Jaime and Brienne into. In fact, the Shredding Project is much larger than it currently is on AO3, as most of the shredded stories still reside in a large, very large Word file on my computer (42 shreddings up to date with a total of 414k words *whispers* 414k mkaaaay, yes I *am* obsessed), and can be found in the respective thread on JBO, where one can read perhaps not an eloquently put-together retelling of favorite fairytales (and some Disney movies) but at least find a conclusion to every story and thus a happy ending, as befits a fairytale.

Bow Down is another story I would mean to include in this list. It came to mean a lot to me personally because I worked my way through it at a time when I was not really having the time of my life for a number of reasons. Thus, finishing that fic did a lot of things for me - and hopefully also with my oh so patient readers. The basic premise is how things would have developed, had Brienne failed to find Sansa and thus fully dedicate herself to the cause of the Blackfish during the Riverrun Siege whose bitterness is clouding his judgment, leaving Jaime in a tough position to choose between his family and the mannish woman he can’t help but care about as much as he does.

A Tale of Spring is one of those fics I wish to include in that already way too long tooting because a) it is a finished story, which is always a rarity in my Wacky world, and b) it is still a kind of headcanon I would have loved to come about in some capacity, as it leaves room for not just happy endings while at the same time giving space for futures to grow for JB as they are cautious to dream of their future past the Long Night, edging on a Dream of Spring.

Paths is one of those stories I am, yet again, very desperate to get back on track with (I mean, it is supposed to lead somewhere, title has it). This story means a lot to me because I just have so much in my head for how this is meant to conclude and just have to get over that one edge to finally ebb into the narrative direction I need this to go (aka follow the path *badum tssssss*). I suppose the story was very much fuelled by my love for G.I. Jane and the dynamic between Jordan O'Neil and John James Urgayle (and Viggo in those short shorts... way too short shorts... damn). At the same time, my aim with this fic is to show not just how tough JB can be and how much ass they can kick together but also how insecure they are beneath the tough surface and how they actually long for something way outside the line of fire.

Train Acquaintances, by contrast, is a rather self-indulgent fic I started to write and was surprised to have found an audience rather fast. I just really liked the theme of trains as a way for two people to meet while at the same time playing with the overly romanticized notion of trains and deconstructing it somewhat. They are a curious means of transportation, to put it mildly. And to then throw in Jaime trying to act smoothly when he is just acting like a dork most of his time was just too delicious to resist. While it’s been a long time (because my computer ate part of a chapter I found really important and that has frustrated me so much, I can’t even tell you), I remain intrigued writing this story because it has a rather distinct mood from what I normally tend to write. And awkward Jaime is just so much fun to write.

Washed Away is one of those fics I am so desperate to get back to that you woudln’t even believe - because it is the one fic most closely tied to the book canon. Its premise is the Lady Stoneheart situation yet to be resolved, wherein Brienne makes a dangerous gamble to save the man she knows is not guilty of the crimes Lady Stoneheart accuses him of, leaving them both to wrestle not just with the dilemmas of this overall situation but also their conflicting vows and feelings for one another.

In the Eyes of the Seven is one of those fics I am yet again very desperate to get back to (yes, I realize I type this sentence far too often, but it is the truth!) but have not yet found a way to bridge between two important plot points, currently creating a gap that keeps me from moving on to the next chapters. It is one of those narrative places where I nerd around freely and explore some mad medley of historical fiction inserted into the history of Westeros, taking up on the runaway nuns of the Reformation period and re-applying it to the Westerosi context by making it about septons and septas instead. While perhaps not a particularly popular story of mine, it is a story I very much enjoy writing as it gives opportunity for lots of introspection, insecurities, and the wish of both characters to break out of the boundaries of the norms set by a static system leaving no room for the likes of the Kingslayer and a woman fancying herself a sword as much as a book or a dress. In general, there are just so many ideas for it inside my head that I really hope to get back on track with that story because there is just so much more I want to tell the readers about in this strange tale.

May the Norns Bind Their Fate strikes a similar tune for me, as I get to gush about my mediocre-at-best knowledge of Norse mythology (albeit a great interest) and yet again change Westeros to my liking to insert the political system of the Viking era into this society (or rather my wacky interpretation thereof). For me, it is both an experiment in terms of perhaps (big perhaps) turning things a bit more heated than I am used to (for Wacky writes no smut, unless it is a literal accident, which only happened, like, once) and diving deep into aspects such as trauma and grief as well as fate and determinacy, since the idea of seers knowing your future has a very distinct appeal in my view, and how knowing one’s “fate” may affect the outcomes of the events. Thus, taking up on the challenge to deal with that in this fic still has me hooked - and I hope I am not the only one.

Last but not least...

An Honorable Man and a Just Woman is a story I am happy to have found an audience because it really gives me something personally to write it. Considering how sadly things played out in the show, I was in dire need of my own little fix-it and have since taken up on the challenge to entertain those questions of what would have changed had Jaime survived, what would be if he were declared King of the Six Kingdoms. Not only does that leave a humbled Jaime trying to find his place in a world he never thought he would see, having seen his ending long before he rode away from Winterfell, but it also leaves him and Brienne with the reality of what it is like to survive when so many died, and how to cope with how they parted and why. And while there are still so many things left unsaid and feelings left unexpressed, one can only hope that those two honorable and just people will eventually find their way around in the new world they are meant to build.

So yeah, I tooted a lot, and I still left out a whole bunch of my weird fanfic children, but those are the ones I feel a great deal of dedication to, even if, admittedly, a lot of them haven’t seen an update in ages. But rest assured, anyone reading this who dared to jump the Wacky train and read along, knowing very well that this strange woman struggles finishing a WIP most of her days, that I am still dedicated to each of those stories (as I am to any story I write). There are simply technicalities and real life not letting me dedicate as much of my time to it as I would need to finally get that final push ahead on a lot of them.

Be it as it may, in the spirit of Glorious Gwendoline Christie, here’s to my shameless self-promotion!

Stay tuned for the next post about the wackiest of Wacky’s wacky creations.

Until then...

Much love! ♥♥♥

#jaime x brienne #jaime lannister #brienne of tarth #gwenspiration #wacky writes fanfic #wacky promotes fanfic #fanfic #fanfiction #yadda #and I love me mah tags

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krixwell-liveblogs · 5 years ago

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Worm asks

Have you tried to give D&D alignments to The Travelers yet, and if not how would you classify them?

Hmm.

Trickster: True neutral

Sundancer: Neutral good

Ballistic: Chaotic neutral

Genesis: ???

Noelle: Lawful? good

Oliver: Chaotic nerd

Gurer’f abguvat vaqvfchgnoyl njshy tbvat guebhtu, ohg V’q qrsvavgryl yvxr gb frr yrff uvagvat znxr vg guebhtu gur fperravat gb Xevk

Sharks: Fher guvat. V’ir orra ehaavat bss gur vqrn gung vs vg’f va gur sbezng bs na ubarfg dhrfgvba, va beqre gb nibvq nabgure Fpragyrff Zna vapvqrag, ohg V pna svarghar vg vs crbcyr jnag?

As usual, translate here.

While you’re checking out all the Simurgh fanart, you should listen to this theme someone made for her: (google Simurgh Husr, first result. Hopefully sharks can just replace this with the actual link) Same person who made that Leviathan theme linked way back.

https://soundcloud.com/user-371879520/simurgh

This was really nice. I like how it does sound like a good melody while at the same time exhibiting some of the pattern-defying nature of the tune. 🙂

I think you miiiight have jumped to conclusions from an ask that simply asked you if you could list the Traveler’s cape and civilian names. Miiight have. Also, I’m pretty sure most of them where refered to by their civilian names in previous arcs.

It’s certainly possible.

It’s not so much that I jumped to the conclusion as that the ask opened my eyes to the possibility of it, which I hadn’t considered before. From there, I had to reevaluate things and consider how things would change if it turned out I had gotten the two mixed up. Ultimately I think I’d prefer for Cody to be Ballistic, but I’m still not sure either way (even with this ask heavily implying it’s Luke).

As for names, most of their names did show up (all the more reason for an ask about matching names to capes being kind of odd if it wasn’t trying to set me thinking of something), but I can’t recall Ballistic’s being one of them. But you know how my memory can be.

That smurf song you posted definitely says “dab dab dab” several times, despite the video being uploaded to YouTube in 2009, and the song supposedly being from 1978. So that’s suspicious as hell.

I… think that has to be the bits where it actually says “tramp, tramp, tramp på en smurf” (“stomp, stomp, stomp on a smurf”).

Either way, now we’re all forced to consider the concept of the Smurfs dabbing, so thanks for that. 😛

“Dragonberry” was Scarfgirl’s old character on City of Heroes, a MMORPG with a superhero theme that no longer exists. I know you’re not reading the chapter comments, but if you ever go back to read the early ones, you’ll see that quite a lot of the early readers were City of Heroes players who had an interest in superhero fiction. That’s why Scarfgirl’s art is signed “Dragonberry”, because it’s how people knew her back then.

Ah, interesting. Fun to hear a little about the fandom’s early history. 🙂

I’ve had many names, myself. Once upon a time I used to make a different name, if not more, for just about every site I was on. One of the names that stuck with me the most was Elementarion, which I used in the game Godville and a few other places (not every Elementarion that comes up on Google now is me, though), because I found long-time friends while using that name.

Though for some reason I wonder why 😛, nobody seemed to want to type it out every time they wanted to mention me. I’ve been called almost every short form of Elementarion there is. El was the most common (made watching Stranger Things kinda odd the first time around, even though I’d long abandoned the name), but I’ve been called Ele, Elem, Eleme, Elemen, Element…

A couple other highlights I remember were Hiatus (in a browser game I don’t remember the name of), OldHeavens (NewGrounds) and Barbute (ArmorGames).

It wasn’t until I came up with Krix Jace, later Krixwell Jace, that I started stabilizing my name.

1. Do you think people ever submit misleading questions just to fuck with you?

Some, probably. And that might be a good thing — if there are some asks that deliberately imply things that are wrong, it makes it harder to trust accidental implications of things that are right.

2. Have you ever noticed that Danny and Eidolon have never been in a scene together?

Hmmmmmm 🤔

Still no Travelers interlude… do you still think you’ll get one, or has this dashed your hopes?

Ahaha

Yeah, no, I’m counting this as everything I asked for and more. 😛

Sharks:

http://www.nospoiler.com/y/WenCYI_Bn7I

Sent in by “ewerwqer”. “Simurgh Scream” by person257 Don’t… Open it with headphones on. Trust me. Don’t.

I’m scared.

*disconnects his headphones*

…not as bad as the description sounded, but yeah, probably a good idea to not use headphones. It’s a well put-together bit of mind noise, nice work. 🙂

Worm fanart

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By Winkle92

Oooh, there are more of these? Awesome! They’re all going in my backgrounds folder.

I love how Behemoth just kinda peeks around the corner of the image border. It’s okay, don’t be shy!

(Also I just discovered I can do slideshows. Neat.)

K6BD ask

My favorite part is the Master of Aesthetic saying “she is an idiot, and a loathsome schemer!” and YISUN is all “YEP, YOU GOT THAT ONE RIGHT 😀 😀 :D”. With Aesma standing right there.

YISUN is the type of person who has “precious trash babies” in every fandom they’re in. 😛

I feel like you all need to know, even if you don’t care about MLP:FiM, that the final episode of the show proved us all wrong.

The show’s resident Skitter is not Queen Chrysalis, the villainous, scheming ruler of a hive full of insect ponies.

Nor is it Twilight Sparkle, the mainest character and socially awkward brainiac who leads a team of five other main characters and always does her research if she can.

No, because of this one episode, it becomes clear:

It’s Rarity.

…

Okay, that’s just a joke, Twilight is still the best fit among the Mane Six, but Rarity using spiders for her fashion did immediately make me think of Taylor.

Twilight – Taylor

Applejack – Brian

Rainbow Dash – Rachel

Rarity – Lisa

Fluttershy – Alec??

Pinkie Pie – Aisha??

(Spike – Shatterbird??????)

K6BD patron comments

1. “What happened to Hansa” is addressed in the Prim story so that’s still out there if you want to know.

Ahh. That would explain why it was left unexplained in Aesma, aside from acting as a noodle incident if you haven’t read Prim.

2. As you observed, the word “demon” has appeared very rarely in the comic, outside of epic title drops & an instance where drunk Allison used it in place of “devil”. It’s used in some of the bonus texts but without a clear definition. Can you speculate further on what it might mean?

The priests seem to call Aesma a demon in the sense of a being of evil, but I don’t think that’s necessarily a definition that’s relevant to the comic’s title (and what appears to be Allison’s “name” in some sense, though the Demiurges do seem to have misinterpreted other parts of the prophecy and Zoss didn’t unambiguously use it as a name). It may be more about inner demons, Allison killing her fears, doubts and insecurities as she grows into the role of a king/queen of the cosmos. Six billion might be hyperbole, in that case, but still.

Alternatively, the prophecy and name might actually refer to Zaid, who could easily end up being the final villain of this thing even if he’s not actually Zoss’ intended successor. In that case, “six billion demons” might refer to humans, if Zaid gets really nasty with his own species. We know very little about Zaid’s base personality beyond “kinda sleazy boyfriend”, so a lot of developments are plausible on that front.

Though there are other parts of the prophecy, as well as illustrations, that do fairly clearly indicate Kill Six Billion Demons is Allison and will be flanked by White Chain and Ciocie, so it referring to Zaid is unlikely.

3. I think the author once said that there are still Aesma-worshippers active in Throne. What do you think they’re like and what would she think of them?

(Somehow the flesh sellars come to mind.)

Well, clearly they’d be Slytherins, if they understand her teachings. Aesma might treat them as ants, if she were still around, but bask in their adoration.

4. Kalpa — a Hindu / Buddhist concept meaning a really fucking long time. Besides in the story you just read, the term has also appeared in the comic at least once so far.

Good to know. I think I kind of just assumed it was Throne’s equivalent of a year, however long it might be.

5. Panopticon — a prison design envisioned by philospopher Jeremy Bentham, allowing all prisoners to be observed from a central point.

Makes sense. When I read it in Aesma’s story, the word’s construction was clear enough that I figured out what it was immediately, before I finished reading the sentence. It very clearly means a place from which to see everything.

6. Root — penis.

Yeah, I figured that one out. 😛

7. To offset the unfortunate scarcity of Cio in your life lately, here’s some of the old concept art:

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(The quantity of arms was somewhat uncertain.)

Oooh.

Her arms and legs look so spidery here. I suppose that might be why she was introduced with the Coat of Arms.

Can Skitter control her?

8. Not related to K6BD but Abaddon has also been working on a tabletop mecha RPG and here’s the very nice cover art:

Ooh, you’re right, this looks very nice. It kind of gives me a K6BD x Steven Universe x Star Wars vibe. And a little bit of RWBY with that one guy that reminds me of Tyrian. I can definitely see the resemblance between this an K6BD in terms of character design style, despite the genre shift.

I particularly like the blonde in the lower left.

In the interest of transparency, I should also mention that the patron has said he probably won’t sponsor full liveblogs of any of the other bonus texts, but has sent me a few recommendations and links to some of the ones I’ve passed (besides Prim). I might read some of those on my own time, though, especially the second Aesma story. If I do, I will of course let you know and discuss any particularly notable observations.

Between: PB7

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meganmazing · 7 years ago

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An All Phlint Rec List!

One guess which pairing I fell head-first into this time...

Need more time? No problem, I’ll give you a hint. It involves SHEILD’s #1 eye in the sky and his long-suffering, slightly anal-retentive handler. The purple Avenger and the dead-not-dead agent. You know them, and if you don’t already love them, these fics will fix that for you. Sorry in advance for how long this is, but there are so many fics and I have too many feelings.

Some of them even feature Pizza Dog, because we are a blessed fandom.

Most of these are rated Explicit, but not all! I even mention a G-rated fic, and I’m proud of me for branching out my recs. I don’t read non-con/dub-con, and I’m not usually into ABO stuff, so you won’t find any of that here, if it’s a concern. Just in case, read the tags! I also don’t read unhappy endings, becasue I’m not about that life.

Click the bold titles (sometimes the little lines indicating a link aren’t there, but the link still is) and don’t forget to leave kudos/comments on the ones you love, to spread that love to the authors! And as always, there will always be more fics that I love/bookmark/scream about in my bookmarks page on my ao3 account: megamazing

College AU

Launch Your Assault by foxxcub Words: 30k Rating: E

Phil Coulson was more than halfway through his six year plan, and everything was chugging along nicely.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t foreseen a cocky junior Art major waltzing into his life, or his floor.

So this is within the same universe as Bulletproof, a stony College AU fic, but I never read that one. Phlint College AU’s I love, but not so much with stony? I have weirdly subjective preferences when it comes to fics.

However, I will rec this one with my dying breath. It is Phil’s POV, and I have such a soft spot for college age Phil now, thanks to this story. As a college student myself, I felt that everything was really realistic and I believed everything. More than that, I want to give both the boys a hug. They need it after this.

Also, as you’ll see later on in this list, I love the “fuck buddies” trope with hidden feelings that are so not hidden it’s embarrassing. And heartbreaking. As much as I want to hug Phil, I also think he needs a swift kick or seven.

Safety Not Guaranteed by foxxcub words: 4k+ (nearly 5k) Rating: M

Phil was informed of the Sigma Iota tradition of White Elephant two weeks before Christmas break. He’d heard of other chapters on campus having holiday parties and had figured the SI’s did the same.

But he was quickly learning the SI’s didn’t do things quite like other fraternities.

Short, sweet, and funny. Of course this would happen to them, within a group of people where blatant, verbal communication is a practically a foreign notion. I laughed, I sympathetically cringed, and there are sexytimes, too. What’s not to love here, really? (Wade has a great cameo, too, so of course this was going on the list)

I'll Learn To Dance If You Promise Not To Laugh by torakowalski words: 10k+ rating: E

A College AU in which there are long distance relationships, misunderstandings, and no one actually spends any time in college.

The insecurity in this fic kills me in the best way. Clint puts on an act sometimes, acting stronger and suaver than maybe he feels. When your bf is older and cooler and smarter and too good for you, what else can you do? Naturally, that strategy works great until it doesn’t.

Thor, Darcy, and Jane are wonderful and I just want more of them! I would never have pictured them as Phil’s roommates, but it works so well and watching Clint interact with them is great.

Everyone deserves a hug: Clint for being a sweet idiot, Phil for being a well-meaning moron, and the roommate squad for putting up with their shit and making it fun.

(more torakowalski fics in the final section, because I’m in love with their work and need to throw more at you)

Other AU

Kindergarten ‘verse by soniclipstick (veriscence) total words: 38k+ Respective ratings: E, G, and E

Kindergarten teacher Clint Barton has never been in a healthy stable relationship in his life. Hell, mostly he doesn't bother leaving his house unless his best friend drags him out for 'socialising'. He's happy with his life as a hermit; he has a dog, and fifteen sticky tiny humans to teach core skills to. That's more than enough commitment for him

But that's all about to change when the new school year brings along with it some major surprises, such as Phil Coulson, the widowed father of one of his students and owner of the bluest eyes Clint's ever seen.

(summary from the first fic in the series)

I am rec’ing the whole series here, because I want to curl up and live in the world the author created. It has everyone you could think of wanting to see from both general Marvel canon and also Agents of SHIELD. Look, as I’m writing this, I want to go back and re-read the first fic. As the author states in the tags, it’s totally Fraction’s Hawkeye, aka my favorite and the best (soz MCU Clint, you’re cool too, sometimes).

This could have been so stupid. It’s a kindergarten teacher AU, it very easily could have been something I read two paragraphs of and clicked away. But it isn’t. When the author says fluff and angst, they mean it. It hurt my heart and made me giddy by turns. Also, sexytimes. But the feelings! I connected so much with Clint in this, and felt so much for Phil, and the payoff feels so earned by the time it happens.

The supporting cast is phenomenal, and it may be my favorite of this whole list, which is saying a lot because I love them all. Even the smaller cameos were hilarious and made me smile.

EVEN IF YOU READ NO OTHER FIC ON THIS LIST, READ THIS SERIES.

Pre-Avengers (mostly)

Slow and Soft by onthewaters Words: 23k Rating: E

When Coulson adds Barton to his team, he expects smartassery. Except there isn't any...

This is it. This is the story I was looking for and craving without even knowing it. That may make zero sense, but I don’t know how else to put it. The writing and the storytelling here are on another level, and I mean that in the best possible way. It shows them getting together - including the beginning of the incredible friendship between the trio (Nat, Clint, and Phil) and Nat and Clint's bond - as well as the most believable/subtle pinning I’ve read in awhile.

Phil's characterization is the best in this one. It’s his POV, and his personality just shines. This is one of the ones I really treasure, and I won’t apologize for how extra I am about it.

Operation Snapdragon by Laura Kaye (laurakaye) words: 10k+ rating: E

They’d decided to call it Operation Snapdragon, Jasper had explained, because snapdragons meant “deception” in the language of flowers.

It would be more accurate to call it Operation Rip Out Phil's Heart And Grind It Beneath The Feet Of Mobsters, but apparently there wasn't a flower for that.

The humor is on point, and I am a sucker for pining!Phil and sarcasm. It’s a fake marriage fic, where they’re undercover as a couple. Tell me that doesn’t sound perfect for these two. BUT WAIT, there’s more: they’re already a thing before the fake marriage mission, and Phil has been feeling insecure in the relationship! Voicing concerns in a healthy manner is out of the question, naturally. Idiots.

It takes place over six months, featuring flashbacks to how Phil ended up in a strip club run by the mob, smiling lovingly at his husband while a mobster talks about how great they are together.

Plenty of miscommunication on par with the trope, and you just want to give Clint a hug, becasue you know what’s going on, but Phil can’t catch a hint. It has art at the end, too, which is adorable.

The Clothes that Make the Man by orderlychaos words: 17k+ rating: E

There was something comforting in the way Clint could focus on Coulson’s dry, deadpan tone as bullets and explosions sounded around him. Come rain, hail or bursts of experimental weaponry, Agent Coulson would be there, calm and controlled in that damn suit, like the personification of order against chaos.

However, contrary to rumour, Phil Coulson was not born in a suit. This is the story of how Clint Barton glimpsed the man underneath and fell in love.

(Or five times Clint saw Phil outside of a suit and the one time he wore a suit himself).

IT’S A FIVE AND ONE, boys, we’ve made it. This my favorite trope in all of fanfiction history. It’s also pre-avengers for the first half, but then kinda after? Coulson isn’t dead and doesn’t appear to ever have been, but in the later chapters, the Avengers are a thing? I’m not sure about timelines. It’s an AU, and it’s awesome.

The important part is that there’s Clint POV and insecurity on both sides, as well as really sweet moments and pinning galore. Plus, it’s rated E, so obviously that too. It’s fairly lighthearted in general as well (meaning there are feelings and angst but there aren’t feelings and angst, if you know what I mean), and after some of the angst on this list, lighthearted fics are a gift.

Coulson Lives - Reunion

Give a Dog a Bone by Laura Kaye (laurakaye) Words: 86k+ Rating: E

What do you do when your dead best friend turns up alive after three years? a) yell at him b) hug him c) ignore him to his face while following him around the Tower like a creeper d) maybe fall in love with him a little e) all of the above

Best summary, or best summary?

This does not have enough kudos or recognition. I know it’s at nearly 960, and that’s a great amount, but it deserves so much more! I still think about this story, and it’s another one I want to re-read soon.

When I mentioned Pizza Dog, this is one of the ones I had in mind.

And Kate!!! His friendship with Kate is everything I’ve ever wanted. And his friendship with Tony, and obviously Nat. Basically, I love Clint having friends and getting to be petty becasue holy shit he deserves to be petty after everything SHIELD has put them all through. At the same time, nothing feels like Phil!whump or emotionally beating a character down unnecessarily.

Clint does everything I want him to, and some stuff I didn’t even know I wanted him to do. There is so much pain, as you’d expect, but there is so much payoff and the balance is perfect. I connect with Clint’s characterization in general, but especially here. Just yes.

Phil’s journey with the loss of his hand and adjusting to life with a prosthetic is also really cool, and something I hardly ever see. Same goes for Clint’s hearing loss. He isn’t deal, but and is completely capable/confident in himself, but there are struggles at times that make me wonder if the author has personal experience because it’s stuff I recognize from my mom’s experiences.

doesn't matter if I bleed by t_fic (topaz), topaz, topaz119 (topaz) Words: 25k+ Rating: E

Clint's never pretended to be deep. He's just the guy who sits back and watches, the guy who makes the shot when he needs to. He's seen a lot of crap in his time, sat through a lot of fucked-up scenes to get to where he needs to be, but this, now--he can't stand another second of it.

This feels like an argument for why the pairing works, and I loved it. It really deep dives into the issues all three of them - Clint, Nat, and Phil - have in a way that feels so real and relatable to me, personally, that it cut me right to the core. I still can't get over the incredible friendship between Clint and Nat in this. I loved every minute, and every win was so, so deserved. I want to curl up and live in the world the author created, tbh. Also, there are sexytimes. Can't forget those.

Tony also has the line early on that nearly made me cry: "Someone has some serious fucking explaining to do, because you," he pokes at Coulson, "we fucking buried you." The scene is already so emotionally charged, and then this and it kills me becasue of all the off-page backstory and emotional weight it gives for the rest of the story.

I’m emo and dramatic about all of these, but I mean it when I say it feels like proof for why Clint and Phil work. Just, yes.

Coulson Lives - some point after the off-page reunion

The Best Bad Ideas by copperbadge words: 17k+ rating: M

When Clint Barton put on the Captain America costume for a mission, he didn't count on Phil Coulson's reaction. Coulson didn't count on Clint crashing his new team to do something about it.

Oh yeah, you read that right. It’s just as funny as it sounds, and all of a sudden you get hit with the angst and it works. Even so, this one is a lot lighter and it’s fun. Cap and Co’s reactions are just as funny, and the gossip sessions between the ensemble are some of my favorite bits. (side note: why have I never considered the badass-ery that would be a Nat and Melinda May friendship?)

Pine Lake Oasis by infiniteeight words: 32k+ rating: E

When SHIELD gets intel that an arms dealer might soon be receiving Chitauri technology, Fury sends Clint and Coulson undercover to establish surveillance, ingratiate themselves with the arms dealer and his right hand man, and possibly intercept the sale. The catch? The arms dealer and his lieutenant are apparently posing as a couple, which means the best way for Clint and Coulson to get close is to pose as a couple, too. The longer the op goes on, the more Clint wonders which relationship is more real.

MORE PRETEND MARRIED TROPES! We can never have too many, in my humble opinion. This one is very different from the mobster one, because it’s set in suberbia with plenty of nosy neighbors and also some arms dealers who are also posing as a couple. Frankly, I’m not sure anyone is posing as anything in this fic when it comes to feelings.

The domesticity in this story is so good and it’s so sad watching them get used to it and hearing Clint think it can’t last...but then! And everything feels earned by the end, instead of just tossed in. You watch them get closer over the course of the story and I love it.

They’re sassy and sarcastic and funny, and so true to the characters we’ve come to love that it all feels so believable.

Just torakowalski Fics

(Yes. I did add a whole section just for one author. If I hadn’t, every category would be overrun, and there are so many good fics out there! But this author gets me, and more importantly, gets Clint and Phil, so it had to be done.)

Been Looking at You Forever words: 18k+ (closer to 19k) rating: E

Clint and Phil are friends. Friends who have sex. That’s all there is to it. Honestly.

Fuckbuddies with a healthy dose of accidental relationship because whoops, who knew “casual” sex with hidden feelings would lead to complications and more feelings?? Set post-Avengers movie, and including all the main faves as side characters.

Guys, I’ll be real with you for a second. I don’t ship either stucky or Tony/Pepper, and yet this has both as background but blatant relationships. And I still don’t ship them, but I believed it within the story and I wasn’t bothered? If that doesn’t tell you how good of a writer tora is...

I am addicted to the way they write Clint and Phil, and the fact that it doesn’t look like they’ll be writing more for that pairing makes me hold on tighter to the stories we do have. Sure, the premise of this fic is a trope, but the relationships between the characters puts it on another level for me. This one will make you crave more of this trope out of all your fave pairings, trust me.

And All the Clocks Came Back to Life Words: 4k+ Rating: T

Phil Coulson isn't a big fan of birthdays, but they're better than being dead.

Pizza Dog is a character again, and so is my favorite apartment complex in Marvel Comics continuity. This is the sweetest story (it’s also the shortest one on this list *gasp*) and it doesn’t have anything explicit, which I know some people prefer, but trust me. The way tora writes these boys is so worth the read. I have the warm-fuzzies just thinking about this fic again - I dare you not to feel like smiling with this one. Naturally, there are grounded feels too, and I just want to protect Clint with my whole being. Luckily, I’m pretty sure Coulson does, too.

Both characterizations are on point.

Keeping the World at Bay Words: 25k+ Rating: E

Finding out that Phil's alive and working with a new team isn't easy for Clint, and neither is helping Captain America track down the brainwashed Hydra assassin that used to be Bucky Barnes.

This is another one where I still don’t ship stucky, but god damnit I’m here for everything in this fic. Clint gets to be fucking amazing in this one, both physically and on an emotional connective-ness level. It uses his own neuroses and backlog of problem/coping mechanisms and puts them to use in the best way. You know, if you’ve seen the movie Age of Ultron (meh movie overall but there are elements I adored) that Clint has the potential to fill the mentor position so well. He gets to do that here, or at least begin down that sort of path, and I loved it.

For all my stony babes, I urge you to give it a shot. Just this once, let me peer pressure you.

I am also always here for Clint getting to be pissed off, because HELLO, he’s got a right. And my heart went out to Phil so hard. Guys, it’s a double reunion fic, as well as the first time potential best friends meet, why are you sleeping on this??

Back to The Place You Are Words: 7k+ Rating: E

Phil Coulson was sitting two tables over from Clint and wearing his Dress Blues. This was making concentrating on anything else pretty much impossible.

Normally, I am Not A Fan of fics where they are broken up from the get-go. Or maybe I just have to be in the right mood/mind set for that brand of angst. AND YET. This fic.

It’s Tony and Pepper’s wedding, and naturally Phil has to dress the part right? Clint should have been prepared, but clearly, he was not. This one is pretty much smut with angst and feels, and like Clint, I was not prepared for how much I would love reading it.

What We've Got Here Is Enough words: 7k+ rating: E

They don’t fuck in the Avengers’ Mansion, that’s rule number one of Having A Secret Relationship With Your Ex-Handler.

This one was great, and involves how the rest of the team finds out about their relationship. Not a ton to say aside from what I’ve already said about how tora writes these two!

Want more recommendations? Let me know! Maybe I ship what you ship and we can scream about the great fanfic together.

#phlint #phlint fic rec #marvel #marvel fic rec #clint barton #phil coulson #clint barton/phil coulson #fanfiction rec #fanfic rec #fanfiction recommendation #phlint fanfic #phlint fanfiction

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lucanogis · 7 years ago

Text

fic: to have and to hold - pt. i

Title: to have and to hold Fandom: Gakuen Alice Pairing: Hotaru Imai x Luca Nogi Length: 5k Summary: It is a truth universally acknowledged that a spy in need of money must be in want of a groom. Or: Hotaru wants to fund her inventions. A widow wants her husband's murderer. And Luca Nogi? Luca Nogi can't help but want the newest addition to his crew. // Part 2 in the GA-crew!verse, written for @ga-party‘s writing challenge: Wedding AU.

{ao3} , {ffn}

Chapter 1: The Plan

Apartment 2B is wholly unsuitable to house a bunch of Japan’s most notorious criminals.

Not only does it come with ten discret neighbors, some of which not only share the building with them but actual room walls, it also lacks any of the equipment necessary for Hotaru Imai to create one of her masterpieces. Instead (and she has made it a point to take inventory of all the many useless additions to her new home) it has three separate gaming consoles, an added fridge for “cooking experiments” and a pet raven called ‘Mrs Rogers’. The roof, which is used for training or weapon storage, also features a fake palm tree and a hot tub the size of a small country. It is therefore completely unsurprising to Hotaru that Mikan decided to move in immediately after her first visit.

The far more complex question is why she has decided to move in as well.

It’s been roughly six months since Z, her former crew, chose to not only join The Academy, a merry band of ruthless murderers, but also unceremoniously oust her in the middle of a job. Luckily - or, if her best friend is to be believed, due to fate - she managed to team up with Mikan’s new crew to escape her own death. Said crew, named Nova by its founder and apparent leader (and Mikan’s idiot of a boyfriend) Natsume, has since welcomed her with open arms. It’s not too difficult for Hotaru to see why, given their apparent inability to budget.

But no member of Nova ever demanded that she join them in their apartment. Hiding made sense the first few weeks after her near death experience, sure. But Hotaru had somehow managed to keep her cover during the ballroom altercation and thus whispers of her joining a new crew had been, if anything, little more than an unconfirmed rumor. At first she’d woken up at night in cold sweat, wondering whether Z had sold her identity, whether they would come after her or any civilians connected to her, like her brother. But research had revealed to her that those who knew her by name had been disposed of as well. As such, that particular worry of hers has slowly but certainly vanished, leaving her to focus on her job.

More often than not, Hotaru keeps her hands and her mind occupied with weapon designs. She trains on the roof, getting to know each member of Nova and their unique skills. She goes on missions with them, always conscious of the distrust some still feel towards her and conscious of the distrust she can’t help but feel towards them.

The moments where her thoughts at last quiet down bring her the answer to her own question: Why did she stay in Nova’s apartment? Because, as incongruent as it seems, it makes her happy.

Of the eight, now nine, crew members Nova has, only six regularly live in the main apartment. The remaining two are scattered throughout the city, either by choice or due to an assignment. Hotaru has to admit she doesn’t miss their presence - being roommates with people that aren’t just Mikan is difficult enough. She has to deal with Natsume burning every meal he tries to cook, Misaki and Tsubasa being disgustingly in love and Luca Nogi being, well. A distraction at best and a threat to her sanity at worst.

Hotaru doesn’t pretend that Luca isn’t attractive. She certainly won’t deny that they’ve had sex in the goddamn hot tub she hates so much. And she won’t even lie and say that he doesn’t have the uncanny ability to make her feel calm, regardless of their turbulent job. But unfortunately for him, Luca has one glaring flaw: He is a spy, much like her. As much as Hotaru likes to fuck spies, she doesn’t fuck with them. It conjures up feelings in her heart and feelings conjure up memories; of darkness and blood and screaming until her throat grows raw and - Suffice it to say, she has no interest in attachments. Mikan is fine because Mikan has always been there. Nogi, however, is not a risk she is willing to take.

Hence they’ve agreed on a particular kind of relationship: Professionals, working together, who sometimes have sexual encounters in expensive bathrooms but who do not, under any circumstances, have an interest in anything more. Hotaru is satisfied with that arrangement. Romance, or the illusion of it, will never weasel its way into her life.

Naturally that doesn’t change the fact that only a week later, Hotaru finds herself standing at the altar, with Luca Nogi sliding a ring onto her finger and white chiffon caressing her skin.

Apartment 2B, Tokyo / April 3rd, 2am

“You need to buy the apartment next door,” Hotaru Imai says. She’s seated on one of the living room armchairs, comfortably basking in the final rays of the setting sun. Her best friend is out on a minor reconnaissance mission and she’s lounging in the living room with Natsume and Luca, something she would normally avoid but which has become necessary due to the simple fact that there is something she wants. “Either you do it yourself or I do it using your funds when you and Mikan are busy having alone time.”

“You’d think I get a choice in this,” Natsume Hyuuga, the Black Cat, comments, “given that this is my crew we’re talking about. And my apartment. And my money.”

“Funny,” Hotaru replies, leaning back and taking a sip of her wine. “I think I vaguely remember most of our funds coming in due to inventions I sold on the blackmarket.”

“She has a point,” Luca Nogi says. He’s sitting cross-legged on the wooden apartment floor, his pet raven picking seeds out of his hand. Natsume narrows his eyes at his best friend.

“You’re only saying that because she’s the only person in this apartment willing to play poker with you,” he declares. “Also, where did your loyalty go?”

“I imagine it’s in the hot tub,” Hotaru says. “You know, with the rest of our crew money.”

Natsume rolls his eyes, though with a sense of triumph she notices him wince at her words.

“You see then why I don’t have the money to buy the flat next to ours,” he says.

“I’ll take a job. Something nice and flashy,” Hotaru offers. “Come on, there must be something you’ve decided against that you can dump onto me. This is a simple trade, Hyuuga: You get to send me on a garbage mission no one else is willing to do. I get to use the money we make to buy another apartment and use it as a work space. It’s a win-win scenario.”

Natsume blinks. “When did you get so desperate?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Hotaru says sarcastically. “Probably around the time someone decided to crap all over my laptop.”

They both turn to stare at Mrs. Rogers, who makes a caw sound before flying up to sit on Luca’s shoulder, half hidden behind his blond hair. Her owner grimaces.

“I did tell you to cover up your stuff if you’re not around,” Luca says. “And I also apologized. Like, fifteen times. Today.”

Hotaru rolls her eyes at him before turning back to the Black Cat. “Look, my reasons don’t matter,” she says. “You need an inventor and I can’t fulfill that role properly until you give me space I can actually work in.”

Natsume folds his arms. He looks less than happy about her demand. “Doing extra missions isn’t an option,” he says.

“Well, why not?,” Hotaru asks. “I’m offering to do them. I can handle danger and without proper equipment, that danger’s only going to get a lot worse for all of us anyway.”

“I get that,” Natsume says tightly. His demeanor changes as he squares his shoulders and narrows his red eyes ever so slightly. This is no longer a friendly discussion, she can tell. “But Imai, I don’t have the money to pay for that flat. And as for the missions you’re volunteering for, I decided against doing them for a reason. They’re not worth the risk. I won’t jeopardize this crew. Not for money and not for you.”

Not for her. Of course. With a sigh, Hotaru drowns the rest of her wine. Again and again, she finds that the Black Cat and her have similar end goals but very different opinions on how to reach them. Normally she would continue arguing but in this case she can tell that any further push on her part would only strengthen Natsume Hyuuga’s resolve. Promises of weapons and handy gadgets are apparently not attractive enough for him to take a risk on an operative, even if it’s just his newest one.

“Pity about that exploding pen I was going to build you,” she says casually. Years of spy training are the only reason she’s able to keep the frustration out of her voice. “See you tomorrow. I’m turning in for the night.”

Hotaru leaves her two companions behind, retreating to her room on the far side of the apartment. Once the door is shut behind her, she balls her hand into a fist and punches her pillow, once, twice, a third time. Only then does the anger licking at her throat subside a bit and give way to exhaustion. She drops down onto the bed, staring at the ceiling with a furrowed brow. Six months she’s worked with the Black Cat, but still he’s unwilling to trust her enough to take a few risks. If she wants to go on a more dangerous mission to earn a larger sum of money, who is he to try and stop her? And who is he to doubt her, to think that she hasn’t calculated the risks and rewards of her plan, hasn’t made sure that no harm will come to Nova?

It’s yet another reminder that Hotaru is still an outsider, much like she’s always been.

She blinks up at the ceiling, able to trace every inch of the plan she pinned onto the wall above the bed despite the room’s darkness. She’s working on an intricate fabric, more than five times as strong as the gear they’re using right now, and able to deflect most bullets. The delicate mesh is no weapon but a shield, one that will keep Nova’s agents out of harm’s way. If only she could convince Hyuuga of its merits, make him realize that the money he gives her is money well spent. Perhaps then the suit she’s working on would be finished and the dreams that plague her would disappear. Perhaps she’d no longer wake up wondering whether today is the day she dies, or even worse, whether today is the day Mikan dies.

But the fabric is impossible to make without a proper workbench and bigger tools and as such, it will have to wait.

Closing her eyes again, Hotaru turns to press her nose into her pillow. Yesterday she’d spent the night with Nogi, and the satin under her skin still smells softly of the cologne he was wearing. They’d come from a reconnaissance operation, his hair still tousled from running, and something inside her had quaked at the thought of doing anything other than kiss him.

So she had done just that.

Right here, in this room, in this bed in fact. She’d straddled his hips with her legs, feeling every inch of him beneath her as she pushed him deeper into the mattress, gazing down at his flushed face from above. He’s always blushing, Hotaru remembers thinking, strangely fascinated by the fact that everything he felt was immediately on display.

Sex is always fun for Hotaru. It’s a way to see anatomy in action, similar to watching her inventions do their job. The way muscle moves beneath skin, the way bodies fit together, the way nerves respond if she strokes them just right - The grip of his hands on her hips and the way she moved against him and he moved against her, their breathing labored as it had been when they ran from their pursuers but at the same time labored in a different way, another kind of fight, a primal kind of combat.

After, Luca had almost fallen asleep next to her, curled up on her covers, but Hotaru kicked him out as soon as she saw his eyes fall shut. He stole a kiss from her before leaving, a fast but heated one, something he always does when they sleep together. It’s almost too intimate every time, but she can never quite tell him to stop. In the end, it doesn’t matter. Even if he takes liberties now and then, she controls this little battle of theirs and they both know it.

Hotaru concentrates on relaxing her breathing, allowing the memories of their night together to once more fill her mind. Hopefully thoughts of more enjoyable times will chase away the fear that gnaws at her, the knowledge that one day their lack of money will result in one of them laying on her lap, gasping for breath as they slowly bleed out. Hopefully images of death won’t haunt her again.

Somehow, she doubts it.

Apartment 2B, Tokyo / April 4th, 8am

They’re sitting around the kitchen table the next morning when Natsume announces they’re going to have an impromptu meeting.

Hotaru is sipping her coffee, idly listening as Mikan recounts her mission from the previous night. Tsubasa is sitting on the couch, reading a newspaper with Misaki’s outstretched legs on his lap. Luca is in the process of making pancakes. He turns around at his best friend’s declaration, wearing a quiet smile on his lips.

“What are we discussing?,” Hotaru asks suspiciously. Is the Black Cat going to kick her out because she asked for more money?

Natsume grunts instead of answering. Luca turns to her.

“There’s a mission that we’re perfectly suited for, I think,” he says. “But we still have to vote on whether or not to take the job.”

This is another one of Nova’s oddities: Although Natsume choses which jobs might be suited for them, every member of the crew can veto an operation. It’s a democratic system, Mikan explained to her once. It’s also a hassle every time.

Luca dumps the finished pancake onto a plate and places them on the table. Tsubasa peeks over his newspaper.

“Breakfast done?,” he asks. Luca nods.

With a grin, the dark haired man gets up, unceremoniously dumping his girlfriend’s legs onto the floor. He sits down opposite Hotaru, Misaki following close behind. Once they’re all seated, Luca vanishes for a few moments before returning with a file. Generally, Hotaru would prefer technology over old school materials, but even she has to admit that hackable objects aren’t the best place for sensitive data. Natsume takes the folder from his friend and tosses it on the table.

“Client’s name is Yuki Arakawa, twenty-three years old, born in Nagoya. Met and fell in love with an investment banker by the name of Ichida Seiji when they were both twenty. Their relationship was reportedly great and so they decided to ruin it by getting married as soon as possible. They got themselves a team of event planners and ended up renting D-Lounge, over in Shibuya. Their grand day was looking to be perfect.”

Natsume pulls a picture out of the folder, showing it to the group. On it, a young woman grins widely into the camera, showing off an impressive diamond ring. A man is standing behind her, his arms wrapped around her waist.

“What happened?,” Mikan asks softly. Natsume sighs.

“On their wedding day, a year ago now, Ichida suffered what officials say was a heart-attack. He made it through the ceremony, exchanged vows with his new wife and then collapsed on the dance floor. Medical examiner says the excitement of the day was literally...heart-stopping.”

“It’s not an uncommon cause of death,” Luca notes. “But autopsy reports do show that there was a foreign substance in his blood. When Yuki Arakawa asked the police about that though, they told her that her husband probably just tried to dampen his own nervosity by indulging in some….ah….illegal substances, so to speak.”

“Did he?,” Hotaru asks. A young, overly excited man taking drugs doesn’t seem too strange a story. Luca shrugs.

“It’s hard to say from the medical report,” he says.

“What matters to us,” Natsume interjects. “Is that his widow doesn’t believe the police’s story. She hired a private investigator to dig into the whole thing. And lo and behold, they found something.”

Luca leans back in his chair. With a quick glance at the folder in front of them, he continues.

“Turns out that Himawari Events Management, the company they hired to plan their wedding, have had a number of dead clients in the past two years or so. There’s been a handful of freak accidents, grooms or brides crushed by falling chandeliers, and a couple of strokes and heart attacks. Suffice to say, the whole thing is more than fishy. But when Yuki told the police as much, they send her away. Next day, a couple of goons cornered her on her way back from the cemetery, roughed her up pretty bad. They told her to keep her nose out of her husband’s case.”

“I’m guessing she didn’t,” Tsubasa comments, taking a bite out of his pancake. He leans forward to pick up the picture of the couple, looking at it from up close. “So someone’s making a game out of killing people on their wedding day? Jesus.”

“Presumably,” Natsume confirms. “What Yuki Arakawa expects us to do is find whoever killed her husband and… bring them to justice. She’s wealthy and the job comes with a nicely sized payment. However…”

“However,” Luca picks up where he left off, “This kind of mission would necessitate us going in undercover, scoping out the event planners. Our best shot is booking a wedding of our own and making sure to find the killer before one of us ends up dead.”

Mikan gnaws on her lip thoughtfully. “Natsume and I are pretty well known, as far as operatives go. And you said Yuki Arakawa suspects the murderer has ties to the police. If we show up looking to plan a wedding and they run any kind of background check, we’ll be in serious trouble.”

“Same goes for Tobita or Shouda,” Tsubasa adds. “They have their own cover identities to protect. We can’t exactly send them to find a killer who’s in league with the cops. As for me...” He glances at his leg, where Hotaru knows layers of bandages are hidden under the fabric of his jeans. “I’d volunteer, but I’m still not exactly in top shape.”

“Which is why I didn’t want to take on this job,” Natsume mutters. Hotaru can’t help but stare at him as surprise wells up from within her. So he’s given me one of the jobs he initially refused, she thinks, blinking in disbelief before composing herself.

“If Mikan and Natsume can’t go because their covers were blown months ago,” she muses out loud, “and Sumire and Yuu can’t go because their current identities are too precious to waste on this mission, then our only option is to send in people whose faces won’t get flagged by the cops and whose identity as agents is unknown to them.”

Luca inclines his head, quietly agreeing with her.

“Your cover is intact,” he says. “So is mine. We can go in as a couple, set up a wedding in the next two weeks and keep an eye out for anything that looks suspicious.”

Hotaru finds herself nodding along. “Mikan and the rest can do an in-depth check from here, hack into the company’s business servers. The two of us -”

“Go in as bait,” Luca finishes. “I’m sure the client is willing to fund our wedding if it means she gets her husband’s killer.”

“And all we have to do is go dress shopping and show up on the big day,” Hotaru muses. It’s certainly a step up from getting shot at and crawling through drainage pipes.

A small smile makes its way onto her face. It works, this plan. They’re the right age for marriage and have certainly kissed enough times to sell the whole ‘young couple in love’ thing.

“Won’t two people getting married on such short notice seem weird though?,” Misaki asks. “I mean, I get that there’s shotgun weddings and all that but…Pretending you’re that into each other seems difficult. ”

Hotaru snorts. Getting Natsume Hyuuga to give her this mission was difficult. Surviving up to this point was difficult. Hell, even cleaning bird poop off her stuff was difficult. But pretending to be in love? Oh, pretending is something she has practiced for most of her life, something she has always needed to hide her bluntness and general lack of charm.

“I don’t think it’ll be an issue,” Hotaru says, allowing herself a smug grin.

Apartment 2B - rooftop, Tokyo / April 4th, 10am

After a unanimous vote in favor of accepting the job, Hotaru makes her way up to the roof with a spring in her steps. While it’s certainly true that a job tied to the police will be risky, she’s confident that they’ll have the murderer found and eliminated before any trouble arises. This mission will go wonderfully and it will finally, finally give her the money she needs. She pushes open the door to the roof and steps outside.

With a content sigh, Hotaru walks up to the balustrade and breathes in the fresh morning air. Her victory makes the spring day seem all the more enjoyable. Far below her, the city is bustling with activity, people running to go to jobs of their own, jobs that involve far less death than hers does. Far less excitement, too, she thinks to herself.

Creak.

Hotaru whirls around at the sound and comes face to face with Luca Nogi, his pet raven comfortably perched on his shoulder. His steps must have been silent enough to trick even her expertly trained ears.

“So,” he says. “We found you a job.”

“Thank goodness for that,” Hotaru mutters. “And...thank you, I suppose.”

“You were the one fighting tooth and nail for it,” he reminds her gently. “I did nothing, honestly.”

“Yeah right. Like Hyuuga would ever change his mind just because I asked him to. I can guess that you pushed him to give me what I want, so just accept my honest gratitude while it lasts.”

“I’m guessing I won’t be seeing your honest gratitude all that often, so alright. You’re welcome, Hotaru,” Luca says. He rests his elbows on the balustrade, watching her as she gazes down at the city.

“You must really want some new guns if you’re agreeing to a mission that could blow your cover,” Hotaru comments. He turns his head, a frown on his face.

“Or, you know, I just wanted to help you out,” Luca says slowly.

Hotaru snorts. Yeah right, she thinks. Why else would he defy his best friend for her? It’s not like they aren’t already sleeping together and if there’s one thing she has learned living in a world of spies, it’s that no one does anything without expecting something in return.

“But,” Luca continues, after a short pause. “You are also right about our equipment being bad. And you were right about our budget, too. We’re usually better at keeping it in check, but that’s generally Yuu’s job and he’s not around at the moment. I try to keep an eye on it but...numbers and maths aren’t my strong suit, I’ll admit.”

“Isn’t it Natsume’s job to look after the money?,” Hotaru asks. Luca’s face darkens.

“Natsume has enough on his mind,” he says softly before shaking his head. He reaches out to touch her elbow, turning her gently towards him. “But anyhow, I came up here for a reason.”

“Oh yeah?,” Hotaru says. She has a pretty good idea of what he means by that. Pushing away from the balustrade, she begins walking backwards until she feels the edge of the training mat at her feet.

“We can certainly have a little morning training session. Some close quarter combat. I’ll win, but hey. You get to watch me move.”

This is the part where Luca walks towards her, lets his hands rest on her hip. The part where he kisses her until they tumble onto the mat, their legs wrapping around each other. He wants her, she can tell by the way his pupils dilate ever so slightly and right now, she wants him too, wants to feel the bare skin of the man who is currently helping her get the money she needs. But Luca only blinks at her, his cheeks coloring. He clears his throat.

“As nice as that sounds, I came to ask you a question. I….That is, you….Do you….”

“Do I what,?” Hotaru interjects impatiently. Luca opens his mouth as if to talk, before stopping himself again.

“This isn’t how it’s done,” he mutters, more to himself than to her, before turning around, his blue eyes trailing across the roof.

Hotaru watches him, annoyance rising up within her. Not only isn’t he joining her at the mat, now he can’t even answer her question? She’s about to leave when he seems to find whatever he is looking for. With purposeful steps that make Mrs. Rogers fly up from his shoulder and seek shelter elsewhere, he walks to one of the many tables she’s scattered machinery parts on. He rummages around before grabbing something and turning back towards her.

“My mum did raise me to be a gentleman,” Luca tells her. “Obviously her teachings didn’t always take, I mean she once said to never use violence and to never steal or kill and honestly, now that I think about, she told me not to do any of the things that are now my job, but -”

“Nogi,” Hotaru says icily, interrupting his rambling. “Get to the point.”

“Right,” Luca says. He takes a deep breath and comes closer, until there is little more than a hand length of space between them. Then, he does something that shocks Hotaru.

He gets down on one knee. “Hotaru Imai,” Luca asks, “Will you marry me?”

Out on a rooftop in April, shivering slightly in the cool morning air and wearing yesterday’s hoodie isn’t exactly how Hotaru expected to be asked that particular question.

“This is a job,” she reminds him. “You don’t have to do this.”

“But I want to,” he says. “So, will you marry me?”

The sincerity in his voice merrily skips over all her walls, jumps past all the parts of her mind dedicated to assessing each situation and lands squarely on her heart, making it tighten in her chest. But no, this isn’t, this can’t be sincere. This is part of the act, Hotaru thinks.This is getting into character. She puts on a saucy smile and offers him her hand.

“Why yes, I will” she says, with a brightness that has little to do with the anxiousness she feels.

Luca reaches out, delicately taking her hand in his. His skin feels warm, clammy almost. As though he’s legitimately nervous. With his other hand, he produces the object he picked up from her work table and slides it onto her finger. It’s cool metal, shaped not quite like a ring, more like a hexagon. A steel nut, something meant to hold her screws in place when she fastens multiple pieces of an invention together. She must have left one lying around. Somehow, despite its less than ideal shape, it fits her finger perfectly.

“It fits you,” Luca says, echoing her thoughts. He clears his throat and gets up again, still holding her hand. Then, he lets her go and steps back again. There is a peculiar look on his face, as though he can’t decide whether the metal on her finger makes him happy or sad.

“I guess we’re engaged now,” he says.

“It would seem that way,” Hotaru replies.

With a curt nod, Luca leans forward. His lips brush her cheek, gentle enough to be little more than a feather caressing her skin. Somehow, the touch still manages to make her shiver. Hotaru wonders whether her pupils are as dilated as his were before, whether her desire is clear on her face. It probably isn’t, she thinks. Outwards expressions of emotion were never her thing. But this is acting, after all. She lets herself smile, expecting to see the same expression on Luca’s face as he draws back. Instead, his usually happy eyes are curiously blank.

“Have fun with your morning training,” he tells her, before turning around. The rooftop door falls shut behind him and Hotaru is left alone next to the training mat.

There is a strangeness to the whole situation that she can’t place her finger on. This morning, after realizing that Natsume had given her a mission because Luca pushed him to do so, she’d felt a gratitude towards him that was difficult to put in words. And then he’d agreed to enter into this fake marriage with her, to pursue the killer and finish the mission by her side. Despite her insistence that they not grow attached, he’d done his utmost for her.

She finds herself staring at the improvised ring on her finger. When he first gave it to her, it was still warm from being kept in his palm. Now the metal is cold. Hotaru pulls up her shoulders in an attempt to let the feeling of wrongness slide off her back but it sticks like oil to her skin. Still, she forces herself to smile. The money she needs is so close, she can almost smell it and her brand new fiancé’s behaviour can’t dampen her excitement.

There is however one thing Hotaru can’t help but notice: Somehow, getting engaged to Luca Nogi feels less intimate than all the moments they shared before.

#gakuen alice #alice academy #hotaru imai #luca nogi #hotaruluca #galice fanfic #m: crew!verse #otp: she could drown me #mine: fanfic #mine: writing #m*#this may not come as a surprise but look lOOK #i rly wanted to expand this universe and so....so this happened #ch. 1 of 4 i'm estimating #a wedding is mentioned but doesn't actually happen #bUT STICK WITH ME GUYS OK #alternative tag: dorks being dorks

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bevioletskies · 7 years ago

Text

20 questions [5/20]

characters: peter/gamora, guardians-centric

fandom: avengers academy/marvel cinematic universe

summary: wasp has a new competition in store for the students of avengers academy, and there’s money involved. so obviously, peter and gamora have to pretend to be a couple in order to win. wait, what?

chapter preview: natasha is suspicious, the students attend a funeral, and mantis gets the wheels in motion on yondu's brilliant (?) plan.

word count: 3554 | total word count: 118k

a/n: did i also mention how much i adore mantis? because i really do.

ao3 | previously | next | masterpost

“Will you please sit down? Your pacing is making me irritated.”

“You’re always irritated, ain’t got nothing to do with Gamora.”

“Might have something to do with you, rat-face!”

“DON’T CALL ME A RAT!”

“BE QUIET!” Gamora bellowed, finally stopping her quest to wear a hole into the carpet so she could reprimand her teammates. Nebula and Rocket were attempting to work on one of the weapons that had been damaged in the Sovereign fight, but honestly, anyone could’ve seen how poorly that was going to turn out.

Unlike Peter, Gamora had been released Sunday afternoon, giving Peter another six or so hours of boredom to go through, completely alone. She had offered to stay to save him from going insane, but he had waved her off, insisting she help the other Guardians get it together.

Although she had been secretly hoping for a continuation of their game, most of the morning was spent giving formal statements and completing frankly mind-numbing paperwork for Maria and Pepper, respectively. She wished she hadn’t felt so small when Maria had stared her down with a steel glint in her eye, asking Gamora if she would be attending the fallen SHIELD agents’ funeral. Did people still think she was so cold-hearted?

Lunch had been idle chat, debating what to do about the Milano’s failing engine and broken wings (again), and then a nurse had come in, checked her over, and promptly deemed her free to go. And now, here she was, babysitting her sister and an especially irritated Rocket.

It was saved by Groot barreling into the room, fresh and bright-eyed after his nap. She sat cross-legged on the floor - her thigh was starting to ache a little from her bones putting themselves back together so quickly - and he climbed into her lap, reaching up for her like a baby who wanted to be held. “Hi, Groot,” she sighed. She could never be too irritated when he was around.

“I am Groot,” he said happily, sprawling across her forearm so his head was resting on her palm. She smiled back, removing her rings so he wouldn’t get caught on them.

“She’s not supposed to know about the plan, you idiot,” Rocket exclaimed. “Stop talking before she starts understandin’ you.”

“What plan?” Gamora’s brow furrowed.

“Just ignore him. It’s what I do,” Nebula drawled, flexing her metal fingers. “Are we done yet?”

“Why? You got somewhere to be?”

“Yes, it’s ‘anywhere but here’.”

“If Quill didn’t go and get himself injured, then maybe he’d be here instead-a you, so - ”

Gamora exhaled slowly. Mantis had taught her about deep breathing to calm the nerves, but she had a feeling that was only going to go so far today.

______

Natasha tapped her pencil impatiently against the leg of one of the many large wooden tables in the Timeless Archives, to the irritation of the rest of the students nearby. Even her tablemates, calm as they may be, were starting to exchange looks, wondering if something was wrong.

“Um, Natasha?” Sam said. “Everything okay?”

“I’m...just...peachy,” she sighed.

“You’re not convincing me,” Steve said, setting down his own pencil and leaning forward on his elbows. “What is it?”

“Can you keep a secret?” Natasha said, smirking. Thankfully, she finally stopped tapping away. “It’s a good one.”

“Aw, come on,” Clint complained from her left. “Now you have to tell us.”

She continued to smirk, drumming her fingers on the table. She couldn’t help the theatrics, it had been ingrained in her a while ago. “I know you boys don’t keep up with Janet’s show, but I do. Not to mention one of her girls’ nights from last week. It’s where I found out that Quill and Gamora are together. And they’ve been holed up in the hospital all weekend after that spectacle with the Sovereign.”

“Didn’t think you were one for gossip about romance,” Steve commented, diplomatic as always.

“It’s not so much about that. It’s the timing. Suspicious, isn’t it?”

“I don’t follow,” Sam admitted. “You know me and Steve. We’re soldiers, not spies.”

“Jan announces a contest that involves money, and suddenly, Quill and Gamora are ‘comfortable’ with telling people about their romantic relationship, which could conveniently bring in ten thousand dollars? Gamora might be my friend, but Jan and I are much closer, and I don’t want her getting emotionally manipulated and duped because the Guardians need cash.”

“You think they’re pretending?” Clint whistled. “Wow. That’s like, couple cliche number three.”

“The weird thing is, I tried to test this theory,” Natasha continued, shooting Clint a dirty look. “I gave Gamora a clear opportunity to obtain ten thousand dollars - legally - and she rejected it. And yet they still keep up the pretense of being together.”

“Doesn’t that prove it’s for real?” Steve asked. “I mean, Natasha, this is a pretty big thing to accuse them of. The Guardians have proven to want to redeem themselves, over and over again. They’re not con artists anymore.”

“But why turn down the money? It wouldn’t be out of character to take it, regardless of whether they’re actually dating or not,” Natasha said, fingers curling into a fist. “And that they’ve been dating for months - you’re telling me that Quill wouldn’t shout it from the rooftops from the beginning? Not to mention the fact he still keeps flirting with other girls, like he’s got no one to be faithful to.”

“You’re jumping to a lot of conclusions, Natasha,” Steve said firmly, his eyebrows knitting together to form his Captain America face. “It’s simple - they didn’t want to take money they didn’t earn, Peter wants to respect Gamora by keeping their relationship a secret until she was ready, and he’s probably just being friendly. You tell me that I seem to be flirting with women all the time when I’m not.”

“I know it’s in your nature to be suspicious of people, but maybe just let this one go,” Sam said, his voice gentle. “If we see anything else that matches your theory, we’ll let you know, but for now, leave ‘em be.”

Natasha’s head bowed, before looking back up. “You’re right. Maybe. I just want to look out for Janet.”

“Word of advice? Don’t tell Tony.” Steve looked certain of that. “He’s going to get too overprotective, and we don’t need any more in-campus fighting.”

“Little hypocritical of you, Cap.” Three heads turned to stare at Clint accusingly. He held his hands up in surrender. “I’m just saying - the whole civil war thing was kind of, y’know what, I’m gonna shut up now.”

______

Classes had been cancelled on Monday so students could pay their respects to the fallen SHIELD agents, causing a bit of chaos as exams, deadlines, and whatnot were shuffled around. Peter in particular had returned to his dorm room the previous night instead of the Milano to double-check his progress on his case study on Inhuman rights, as much as he had wanted to be back with his team. It was stupid, considering how much time he spent with them, but he’d missed them as he fell asleep on his much-nicer bed that night.

And thanks to his unusually comfortable mattress, he was now late for the funeral. Just perfect.

Granted, the service wasn’t about to start yet, but he knew Gamora was waiting for him outside the building so they could walk to the quad together. He nearly flew out the building in haste and almost missed her, standing right at the door, in what appeared to be a black blouse tucked into full-length leather skirt, with a capelet thrown over her shoulders. Her hair was expertly pinned up in a way that suggested it had been Mantis’s doing. “Whoa,” he said. Then he paused. “I said that out loud, didn’t I.”

“Yes you did,” Gamora said, shooting him an amused smile. She approached him slowly, laid a gloved hand on his arm, and leaned forward to gently kiss his cheek. Nearby, Peter could hear the distinctive giggles of Mary Jane, Gwen, and Felicia, likely observing them, even more likely taking pictures.

“Sorry,” he said sheepishly. “I really shouldn’t be commenting on how you look for an occasion like this. But you do look really nice.”

“Your tie is crooked,” Gamora said in return. “But thank you.”

The quad was a few minutes’ walk from the dorm, the air feeling more and more somber as they got closer, students flooding in from several directions. Peter could vaguely see Professor Pym wearing a black lab coat, chatting to Odin, who was wearing some of the nicest pitch-black furs he’d ever seen.

As they walked along the fringes of the seating area, looking for the other Guardians, Peter reached for her, lacing their fingers together. Gamora turned to look at him for a moment, confused, before a moment of realization crossed her face and she squeezed back. They eventually filed in on the end of a row of seats, where the others looked relieved that they had made it in the nick of time.

______

After the service and transfer of the coffins to individual quinjets, which would take the families back to their hometowns to bury their loved ones, the entire campus seemed particularly morose. It was a comfort, Gamora thought, to have Peter’s hand in hers.

Students walked about rather aimlessly, stopping to talk quietly with their heads bowed to whoever they ran into. Agent 13 seemed the most distraught - although she had been the one to lead the successful charge, she had also been trained alongside one of the dead.

“You cannot blame yourself,” Peggy was saying to her grand-niece. “You did so well, my darling.”

“You would've done better, Aunt Peggy.” Sharon looked so devastated that Gamora had to force herself to look away.

“Death isn't something I wanna think about much, but man, stuff like this really gets to me,” Peter murmured sadly.

“It is not the dead that I pity,” Gamora said. “It is the living, the ones who go on to remember them. Or forget. You and me, for example.”

Peter’s face softened. “Our parents.”

“No service held for my family, and just one person alive who knew them at all,” she nodded, pulling them aside to stop by a tree. “Are you feeling alright? You've been leaning slightly. I should check your stomach wound.”

“It's just a little sore on one side, I didn't wanna put too much weight on it,” Peter promised, taking her other hand. She looked down at their joined hands, feeling the growing heat of the morning sun radiate through them both.

“Gamora?”

Startled out of her reverie, she turned to see Adam standing there, slightly puzzled. “Oh. Hello,” she said, attempting to feign a polite smile.

“You two doing okay? Sorry I didn't get to check in on you both at the medbay, but Yondu didn't seem so intent on me going in,” he said, an awkwardness in his face that wasn't usually present. Gamora realized he was looking at their joined hands.

“I should talk to Yondu about that, sorry, man,” Peter said, reaching out to pat his shoulder. “How about you? I heard nothing after we got taken out.”

“I headed straight for the ground as soon as you guys got hit. Ships here just aren't built for a thin atmosphere,” Adam shrugged. “So, uh, Gamora, about the amps…”

“Maybe another time, Adam.”

“But - ”

He was interrupted by a loud groan, Peter clutching at his side. “Ah, uh, babe, we might have a problem.”

Alarmed, Gamora instantly ducked under his shoulder to support him, nearly tangling their arms in the process. “Medbay?”

“Dorm’s closer, I just restocked my first aid kit. Ahh, careful!”

“We should go,” Gamora said briskly, nodding at Adam as an afterthought, hauling a surprisingly heavy Peter back to the dorms.

He continued to make agonizing noises all the way back, to the point of scaring Peter Parker in the elevator. It was only after Gamora got them inside and set him down on the bed, that he suddenly fell silent.

“Quill?” she whispered, worried he had lost the ability to breathe. When she looked up from where she'd been ripping at his shirt, she could see his face, perfectly normal, as if nothing had happened.

“You didn't want to be around him,” Peter shrugged, leaning back on his elbows. “I could tell.”

“So you faked it? That is not your decision to make!” She moved as if to run her fingers through her hair, only to remember it was pinned up. He briefly wondered if she was going to strangle him instead.

“You seemed uncomfortable,” he protested. “You're weirdly polite when it comes to Adam. You would've brushed him off if he was anyone else.”

“What are you trying to say?” She straightened up, staring down at him.

“I - nothing! Just that you're generally nice to him than you are to most people!” He sighed. “It just makes me wonder if maybe, I don't know…”

“No,” Gamora said firmly. “I know what you're going to say, and no, I do not. Don't ever do that again, or I will - ”

“Kill me, I got it,” Peter said, holding up his hands in surrender. “Gamora, I know you can handle yourself, it’s just instinct, alright? Especially in social situations, you can be kind of...a loose cannon. If it was just a random guy threatening your life, I know you'd have it under control in five seconds flat, but this was different. I shouldn’t have taken that away from you, and I’ll let you deal with it next time. Promise.”

He held up his hand and stuck out his pinky finger in what looked like some bizarre salute. She frowned. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, right. It's called a pinky swear,” he said with a chuckle. “My mom and I did this sometimes. It’s for when you agree on something, like shaking hands.” He took one of her hands, and gently maneuvered it so their fingers were looped together.

“It looks more like a lazy way to hold hands,” she commented.

“It can be that, too,” Peter smiled, swinging their joined hands between them for a moment. Gamora had to bite her bottom lip to stop herself from smiling back. As irritating as he could be, Peter was always good at making her feel better. It was an annoying talent of his.

“I should go,” she sighed, pulling away rather reluctantly. “Now that I know you're actually not hurt. We have homework to catch up on.”

“You going to the Milano?” he asked. She nodded, and at that movement, she could feel her hair slightly shifting and falling out of its shape. She paused to reach up and undo the (rather excessive amount of) bobby pins, letting her hair cascade back down around her shoulders.

Gamora looked over to see Peter staring at her oddly. “What?”

“Nothing,” he said, though his eyes were oddly fixated on her hair and not her face. “I'm just thinkin’ about how I'm fake-dating the coolest girl in school.”

She ducked abruptly in an attempt to hide the heat rising in her cheeks. She really needed to get out of here before this went somewhere she wasn't prepared for.

______

The rest of the day was a somber affair, especially for the SHIELD-turned-Academy students who had known the fallen. Agent 13, Phil Coulson, and Daisy Johnson in particular had gone back to bed, the weight of the world pulling them back to sleep, while others coped by sneaking off to Club A early, in hopes that Ultron bot would be ready to serve them drinks.

For Peter? He had invited Mantis to his room so they could study together. She hadn’t been at the school very long, but luckily the Academy was very blasé about inviting new students every month, so the curriculum wasn’t nearly as structured as regular schools, allowing her to catch up.

They were both lying on Peter’s bed, surrounded by books, looseleaf paper, and their holo-tabs, working their way through the case study Peter had attempted (with little success) last night. He smiled when he saw Mantis’s wrist, adorned with her neon green friendship bracelet, clicking softly as she wrote. There was a few charms strung on, including a little alien head, a star, and a music note. Herself, the Guardians, and her brother.

He had grown very fond of Mantis very quickly, despite his initial worries about her empathic abilities. As much as he liked Gamora and tolerated Nebula, their personalities could prove too much at times, exhausting, even. Mantis’s gentle, innocent nature was bittersweet - a reminder of how she had grown up in isolation, but allowed her to explore things for the first time with her new family. Although they weren’t related by blood, Peter instantly felt the need to look after her and help her in understanding herself and the world around her. Mantis had admitted she had no idea how many years had passed while living on Ego, so she didn’t know how old she was, but her emotional maturity had made him think of her as his younger sister.

“You are not very good at concentrating,” Mantis informed him, breaking him out of his thoughts. “Do you want to talk instead?”

Peter shrugged nonchalantly. “I mean, if it’s between working and not working, I’m gonna choose not working. My brain’s still a little fuzzy from the funeral.”

“Would you like some help with that?” she said patiently, reaching to touch his arm. He shook his head. “Okay. Well, um, Peter?”

They both shut their books, rolling onto their sides so they could see each other better. “Yeah?”

“I am sorry I did not come to see you in the hospital,” Mantis said, looking so worried that Peter’s heart broke for her a little. “I am not a very good sister.”

“You’re a great sister, Mantis,” he said firmly. “Groot needed someone to look after him, you were the best one for the job. I was okay, Gamora was there with me.”

She perked up at this. “You and Gamora...our classmates seem to like the idea.”

“You mean the whole relationship thing?” Peter smiled. “I don’t know how it’s gonna go. I mean, we’ve got like, two and a half months left into this whole thing. Can we really pretend for that long?”

“You think it will stop being pretend?” Her eyes were huge, practically staring into his soul, daring him to answer.

“No, I mean, it’ll be hard to keep faking it. Someone’s gonna slip eventually, accidentally tell someone. Probably me,” he admitted. “I’m almost hoping we’ll have some month-long expedition somewhere so we can spend most of it away from everyone else.”

“So you are immediately going to break up after the yearbooks are out? That does not seem smart,” Mantis said, tapping him on the nose with her pencil. “You would have to at least pretend for a little while longer, or it will be suspicious.”

“We probably should’ve thought this through.” Peter groaned, flopping his head down onto a pillow. “I thought I could do my usual thing, y’know, make stuff up as I go, but that’s probably not gonna work this time.”

“You need a plan,” Mantis said sagely. “And I have one.”

His head popped up. “What? You do?” He watched in awe as she pulled up a file on her tablet, with what looked like a step-by-step list of things to do in order to keep up the charade. There were links, pictures, and did he see the word ‘contingency’? What the hell? “Uh, what the hell?” he said aloud.

She only grinned at him, and wow, he really needed to teach her how to properly smile. “The others thought it would be a good idea to come up with a plan while you two were gone. I helped!” She scrolled to the top, eager to show him. “We were thinking that this weekend, you and Gamora should go on a trip alone together.”

“The Milano is down,” Peter said, confused.

“Not on another planet, just here,” Mantis said. “You would not have to pretend for the benefit of our classmates, but it would be seen as romantic. A small getaway after a traumatizing event.”

“That is...actually kind of brilliant,” he said, giving her an encouraging smile. “I mean, Gamora and I need to do a supply run anyways. We could come up with more fake dating ideas while we’re away from everyone else, and get some work done without dealing with school drama.”

“Exactly!” she said excitedly. “You would just have to do a couple things - maybe go to a museum or something - and be seen in public. Janet will want to look at social media to see if the famous Guardians have been spotted.”

“You’re a genius, Mantis,” Peter said, slinging an arm across her back. “So what else have you got here - ”

“No peeking,” she squealed, yanking the tablet away. “The rest is not done yet. So you will do it?”

“I’ll talk to Gamora first, but she’ll probably agree,” he replied, rolling back to face the ceiling. His glow-in-the-dark constellation stickers winked at him as the evening darkness swept into the room. “I hope she’ll agree.”

a/n: short chapter, but as you can see, i'm setting up for some interesting times ahead ;) also i promise adam and natasha aren't antagonists, they're just a part of the dynamic. it's why i set this fic in the AVAC!verse, so the Guardians aren't just operating in a vacuum as they currently are in the MCU.

If anyone is wondering what Gamora's funeral outfit looks like, I imagined it like this.

#starmora #peter x gamora #peter quill #gamora #avengers academy #myfic #myfic: 20q #the visual of peter/gamora doing a pinky swear though??#i just really liked that for some reason

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tackyink · 7 years ago

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Since yesterday we were on the topic of bad irrational feelings, and since I’ve read this amazing blog post by Amanda Palmer, and these are good things to say out loud because there are always others who are thinking the same but are afraid to, because it’s ugly, because maybe it’s just them (it’s never just you, in anything, ever), I’m going to.

Jealousy sucks.

Comparing yourself to others sucks.

And both things are completely normal when you are producing content.

I’m going to talk about writing, because it’s what I do, but I think it’s applicable to many other things.

I can safely say that the three things I struggle with the most when I’m writing are these:

Planning story arcs

Remembering why I’m writing

Not thinking of what others are writing

And while the first one is a technical aspect, the other two are very much tied, and relate to expectations: the expectations of my readers, and the expectations I have towards myself, respectively.

So I have a bit to say about those two subjects.

Remembering why I’m writing

I can say without hesitation why I began writing everything I’ve written: drabbles, one-shots, long stories. It may have been an idea, a feeling, a character that stood out, but there’s at least one reason that’s prompted me to sit in front of a screen for hours on end, painstakingly chaining words while I could have invested that time in something more productive like, say, finally learning to play my guitar, or how to flip a Spanish omelette without transforming the kitchen into a war zone.

The problem pops up with longer stories, and I honestly can’t say if it would if instead of posting chapters on their own I wrote the entire story before I began to share it.

The comments, hopefully, arrive. They are, hopefully, mostly positive. And when the initial rush of the shiny new story has worn off, I am left with an empty Word doc and an inbox full of well wishes and update soons.

Well, I think to myself, I can’t disappoint them now. So I sit down and hammer away at the keyboard.

This cycle keeps repeating. It’s mostly a positive, encouraging influence. But sometimes, in the process, writing becomes a drag, an important plotline stale, and I need to force myself to go through the motions. I keep thinking, will they like this? Should I throw in some shippy moments? Are they reading for this? Will they feel baited if I write this way?

(Nowhere in the description of Inked on Skin says humor or romance, I excuse myself, but unwittingly or not, the tone is what it is. Maybe the genre tags I slapped on it are a lie, a shield to protect myself from expectations. But while I write, it’s a constant of not funny enough, not dynamic enough, will they want to stick long enough to see where this relationship is going? And jokes don’t sound funny and intimate moments aren’t as touching when you’ve been staring at those pages for six hours that day.)

And sometimes the most obvious question is forgotten among all the others: Do I like this? Would I read this?

The answer isn’t always yes, but writing gets much, much easier when I direct the questions towards me instead of them. I think I’m doing a little better on that front.

Not thinking of what others are writing

This is the worst offender. The one that is capable of keeping me away from my own stories for days or weeks. The great, disgusting self-pity generator.

I’ve said it a few times, but just for the record: when I have an ongoing fic, I usually avoid reading stories for that same fandom. Very rarely I make exceptions, though some things are so well written and catch my attention so powerfully that I can’t stay away from them.

And here come in the bad, ugly feelings of inadequacy. Because mixed with the happiness of having found that fic with perfect characterization and a plot you like is also the question, ‘why can’t I be like that author?’

It’s insidious, pervasive, and it takes over if I dwell too much on it. I hate it, and I keep doing it. I see in them things I want to do, styles I want to write in, characters that I wish I’d handled that way and ideas I wish I’d had, and I look at all the things I don’t have instead of those I do.

And it’s so easy to land in that pitfall it’s scary. Then I start wondering where I went wrong.

If I’d read more. If I’d read better books. If I hadn’t wasted nearly a decade of my life not writing. If my native language was English. If all those things that haven’t happened would have, well, that’s fucking silly, I wouldn’t even be me to begin with. They haven’t happened, never will, and I gotta make do with the resources at hand. And I am not doing badly, if I’m being objective.

In fact, I’m doing pretty fucking swell. When I was writing fic over ten years ago, getting more than two or three comments in any given chapter would have been a blessing. Getting over 100 reviews on a story? Ha. That was something only really good writers did. Those were on a whole other level. Maybe, maaaybe one day I’d get like, 20.

I can feel sixteen year old me glaring daggers this way. I’ve become one of those people I envied, and what now? Now I’ve found somebody else to envy. What else do I want from me? I don’t know. But it’s always more, more, more.

And I think it’s important to recognize that these feelings exist, because otherwise, they eat away at you. And if you see them for what they are, you can air them out, or put a lid on that train of thought. You can step back and tell yourself that you are being an idiot, that you have the right to be an idiot because feelings are not something you can just avoid, but you also have an obligation to yourself to stop it. Take a breath, look another way, look at your work. Don’t let them drag you down. You’ve come all this way, and that’s amazing. There are people who wish to be in your shoes. You can keep getting better, closer to your ideal, if you keep working, keep in mind that whatever defines your work is never the same that defines another’s. That the same way you find something special that touches you in your favorite authors’ works, someone out there is getting the same from what you do. That’s incredible.

It can be a small consolation, sometimes, but it serves me well. And I thought it was important to share, because creating content is often a lonely work, and the more time you spend in your mind, the easier it is to forget that there’s an entire world outside of you, and that it’s never going to judge your work as harshly as you do. And that often, you are much closer to what you want to be than you realize.

#long post #tacky ramblings #writing

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inyri · 8 years ago

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Equivalent Exchange (an SWTOR story): Chapter Fifteen- Legacies

Equivalent Exchange by inyri

Fandom: Star Wars: The Old Republic Characters: Female Imperial Agent (Cipher Nine)/Theron Shan Rating: E Summary: If one wishes to gain something, one must offer something of equal value. In spycraft, it’s easy. Applying it to a relationship is another matter entirely. F!Agent/Theron Shan. (Spoilers for Shadow of Revan and Knights of the Fallen Empire.)

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Legacies

15 ATC. Rakata Prime.

If it was uninhabited, this would be a beautiful planet. The view from the landing zone, white sand beach and pristine water as far as she can see, makes her wish for a bathing suit and a drink with a little umbrella in it. The pieces of wreckage do rather spoil the scenery, though, and if her experience on Tatooine is anything to go by she’s guessing the natives aren’t friendly.

Still, Nine strips down to her undershirt while she waits to review the mission parameters, letting the sun shine on her shoulders. It’s hot, after all, the warmth a pleasant change from the chill breeze of Manaan; maybe she’ll even manage a hint of a tan. (Probably not. Probably sunburn and more damned freckles, but one can hope.)

She’s also pretty sure, as she bends to lay her jacket on the Nightshrike’s steps, that that ‘pub agent’s staring. When she looks back over her shoulder his sightline flicks upward about two degrees, settling on her back holster.

Definitely staring. Hm.

“My eyes are up here, Republic.”

He blinks, then gestures toward the small of his own back. “Just looking at your holdout.”

“My holdout. Really.” She turns fully around, drawling out the words in amusement. “Assessing my weaknesses?”

Theron- she should use his name, since the four of them seem to be stuck together for the time being (a Sith Lord, a Cipher, an SIS agent and a Wookiee- a list that ought to end with “walk into a bar,” really)- shrugs. “Let’s call them limitations, if we’re pretending to be friendly. Don’t you worry you can’t draw it left-handed?”

“Very diplomatic of you. But,” she says, lifts her right hand and waves at him as she twists her left behind her back, drawing the little blaster and bringing it forward for him to see, “limitations are for amateurs. Modified release. And a centered holster gets in the way of my rifle.”

That might have been a nod of approval; not exactly a chatterbox, him. “Fair. I’m ready when you are, by the way.”

She crosses back over to where he’s standing, looks over the planned route on the map projected onto the side of Jakarro’s ship. “I didn’t realize there were still this many Rakata alive.”

“Outside of this planet, there aren’t. There were more a few hundred years ago, from what I’ve read, when Revan was here. But ever since the Star Forge was destroyed this place has been pretty much off limits.” Theron gestures toward one of the larger pieces, a colossal shard of twisted metal at least a quarter-kilometer long. Three whole sentences in a row- that’s the most he’s said since they all left Manaan. She might actually be winning him over. “They’re dying off, little by little.”

“Normally I’d call that hypocrisy,” she says, “but given the first Rakata I met tried to turn an entire research base into cybernetic slaves, I’d call it good riddance. And didn’t Revan want to use the Star Forge? It looks an awful lot like he blew it up.”

He shakes his head. “You don’t know the story, clearly.”

“Not really, no. I know Revan was a Jedi and then a Sith and then a Jedi again, and then he tried to kill the Emperor and ended up imprisoned for three hundred years.” Until you idiots let him out and he tried to build another army, she doesn’t say. She’d read some of the Revan dossier, years ago, but they were focused on weaknesses then, not deep details of the man’s biography. “We don’t focus on Jedi history much.“

“That’s-” he clearly wants to add something more, but bites his lip- “that’s the very short version, yeah. You’re missing a pretty big chunk out of the middle. But no, he tried to use it the first time. The second time he came back to- he destroyed it, that time, so it wouldn’t be used.”

She waves a hand dismissively. “Like I said, Jedi history’s not my thing.”

He shrugs and turns back to the map as Lana comes striding down the exit ramp.

“Are you ready, Cipher?” Lana, too, looks to the map. “Feel free to bring whichever of your crew you prefer. Jakarro’s agreed to be our distraction, so he’ll be heading out momentarily. I’ve tracked Darth Arkous and Colonel Darok to the temple complex here-” she points- “which is your destination. On arrival, confirm target presence and activity.”

“Wait. I thought we were all moving on the temple together. If they engage I’m going to need more than a two-man team, especially with a Darth in play.”

“Avoid direct engagement unless absolutely necessary. Jakarro will be nearby, and we’ll be monitoring you from the shuttle here and providing remote support. We need to figure out what they’re doing before we decide on a plan of attack.” Lana continues marking points of interest with careful swipes of her finger along the projection: the temple and an adjacent courtyard; a few villages along the shoreline; further inland, a stone circle with-

She eyes the map dubiously. “Is that a rancor?”

“Yup.” Theron reaches across and adds sharp claws and pointed teeth to the drawing. “Also recommend not engaging the rancor. Take the long way around.”

“Noted.” She flips him off and turns back to the Sith Lord. “Seriously, though, I’d be happier with a four-person team. I can only cover two with my generator, but can’t Theron-”

He shakes his head. “I don’t have stealth equipment with me. If you’re going in cloaked, you’re better off letting me slice from here.”

She arches an eyebrow at that. If he was involved in the Republic’s strike on Korriban in anywhere near the same capacity Lana had been for Tython he must be fairly high up the food chain, but he’s not dressed like it; as far as she can tell he’s got two pistols and probably a holdout but no longer-range guns, no decent melee weaponry, no poison, minimal armor and now no stealth. She’d pulled his dossier on the way from Manaan, though it didn’t tell her much- he’s been active a few years longer than her so he’s probably a few years older, but no codenames, a few vague links to old missions but nothing concrete which means either he’s never gotten caught or, if he did, he killed his captors. If that’s how the SIS supply their elites, no wonder she’s run circles around every ‘pub agent she’s ever met.

(Hunter didn’t count.

Hunter wasn’t SIS. And in the end, when she slipped her collar, broke free of the leash Hunter used to drag her by, she put a round straight through that bitch’s head.)

“Your people don’t give you much in the way of kit, do they?” Glancing in his direction again, she gives his gear another once-over. “You- oh, dear. You are a field agent, aren’t you? Not that there’s anything wrong with data analysis, of course, but-”

“I am not,” he narrows his eyes at her, lip curling in irritation, “a desk jockey. I can handle myself just fine.”

“Oh, I bet you can.” She grins. The expression on his face is somehow familiar- she’s sure they’ve never met before, but he reminds her of someone that she can’t quite place. It’ll come to her eventually, she’s sure.

(Lana giggles.

Oh, shut up, you.)

She ends up bringing Temple; she can still use more practice with stealth and Lana and Theron keep promising, even as they finalize the route and Jakarro takes off along the path toward the first village, that it’s just a scouting mission. She hooks the little camera over her ear, connecting the cable to her transmitter so they’ll have visual. Get in, report, hold position. Easy.

So of course it goes to complete shit less than an hour in.

The attack on the village should have drawn the Rakata guards off the shoreline path. They should have all been chasing Jakarro by now, but instead they’re fortifying the watchposts with more guards and trained beasts, fleeing the villages like cowards but running straight into her path at the same time. She and Raina get past the first two by skirting along the water’s edge but the third’s a problem- they’ll either have to wade and risk being heard, or try to get up over a rock outcropping that takes them dangerously close to the beasts.

She signals; Temple nods, and she draws her pistol and her knife, just in case, as they head up over the rocks.

They would have made it. Halfway past the guards a little sliver of loose stone goes sliding down the cliff face, though, and hearing the noise one of the creatures turns its head, takes a deep sniff- and looks straight at Temple, growling. The Rakata beside it huffs and raises a hand.

They freeze, too late.

She shoves her down as an arc of lightning takes a chunk out of the ledge above their heads and the debris breaks their stealth field. After that it’s messy, six Rakata and four warbeasts between the two of them, and even as she gets her generator up again and they wade into the sea to try to purge the scent of blood from their armor she can hear alarm klaxons sounding all the way up the coast.

“The coast route’s a no-go.” She hisses into her transmitter. “We’re blown. Requesting extraction plan from Watchpost Gamma.”

“I’m not so sure. The main complex is still quiet.” Lana answers back, her tone less confident than her words. “The alarm doesn’t appear to have reached them yet. Keep going.”

She pulls Temple into an alcove as a patrol team moves past their position. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this op. Reroute me, but I’d be ready to move in if I were you.”

“Take the right-hand path from your position,” Theron chimes in. “It’ll take you inland.”

“Past the rancor.”

“Right through it.” He sounds entirely too smug. “Unless you don’t think you can handle it?”

He’s trying to goad her, of course- it’s the favorite pastime of rival agencies since the dawn of the modern age, when they’re not actively trying to kill each other- and she isn’t going to fall for it that easily. Beside her, Temple rolls her eyes. Cocky bastard, she mouths, and she grins and nods agreement. “Watch and learn, Republic. Watch and learn.”

One can’t sneak past a rancor, not really. It’s got far too keen a sense of smell and even after their quick salt-water bath there’s still enough blood and enough sweat in their armor for a hunting species to pick up. The best she can hope for, then, is to turn the surroundings to her advantage; she gives Raina and her sniper rifle a boost up onto one of the standing stones around the ring where the creature prowls.

Still hidden, she creeps from the shadow of one stone to the next, gets back behind and downwind of the rancor and raises her knife, signaling up for the first shot as the field around her flickers out and-

She catches sight of the Rakata chief out of the corner of her right eye just before he closes on her and has just enough time to duck; his staff whips through the air above her head and she dodges, rolling forward through the rancor’s legs. A rifle shot takes it between the eyes and it roars, stomping, as she dives forward again.

“You could have mentioned the clan chief.” She has to shout to be heard over the bellowing as she peers around a pillar, launches a shock dart straight at the charging figure.

“Hold on-” Theron again, accompanied by a very loud metallic bang- “Lana’s meditating again, and I lost visual for a sec there. What are you- oh. Well, you’ve got him contained now, right?”

“For the next ten seconds, at least.” She gets around the Rakata as his limbs twitch. Her knife can’t cut through the ceremonial collar at his neck so she slashes at the backs of both legs before he can turn. “Are you two trying to get me killed?”

(Of course we weren’t, Lana huffs indignantly. It wasn’t well-scouted, yes, but-

I realize that now, she grins. But I didn’t have the best track record with SIS or the Dark Council at that point, remember. For all I knew, someone had put both of you up to taking me out.

I suppose you have a point.

She shoves another biscuit into Lana’s mouth. Of course I do. Now stop interrupting.)

“Don’t be-” he sighs. “Look, we’ll have better intel when you get to the temple. I’ve got about three-quarters of their the surveillance system sliced and I’m working on the last few now.”

The chief’s slower now, at least, staggering around and toward her as a flash off Temple’s rifle sight warns her out of the line of fire. “You’d better. I don’t do suicide missions.”

The shot, unlike her blade, gets through the collar just fine, and with no further distractions the rancor, too, goes down in relatively short order. It’s a shame they haven’t got time to take the teeth and claws- the last time she fought a rancor she’d had Vector and Doctor Lokin go over the corpse; Lokin had needed rancor bile for his research, for whatever reason, and they’d sold the sharp bits at the Mandalorian Enclave for a pretty sum- but the noise of its death has drawn a crowd, a tight phalanx of guards approaching over the rise of the hill.

Just in time, her generator recharges, and they sneak carefully away toward the temple complex.

The building itself is massive in a way that reminds her more of Korriban than Dromund Kaas. The courtyard fans out around the temple in all directions, great stone steps drawing one’s eye up to the high spire in the center, flanked by rough-hewn statues of a masked and hooded figure.

Revan. Fucking Revan, again.

When they’d raided the Foundry the rest of the strike team swore up and down that Revan had died. (Herself, she’d gotten thrown head-first into a pillar and spent the last moments of that desperate fight in stunned semi-consciousness. Not her finest moment.) He couldn’t have survived it, they said, all that lightning, even though he hadn’t left a body behind- that sometimes happened, apparently, with particularly powerful Force-users. His dream of a droid army, at least, had been quite thoroughly quashed.

They’re trying to build an army too, this group of conspirators, so she supposes it makes sense they’d end up here. Their plans on Manaan had failed- Rakata technology there, as well- and there must be some functionality left in that ancient temple. Was that what they’d been looking for in the archives on Korriban and Tython? Maps to ancient places, long lost to living memory. Places like the Foundry, like the Star Forge that used to fill the sky here…

But why?

Theron’s voice in her ear derails her train of thought. “Hey. I’ve got visual on the temple and… um. Did you bring any ion grenades with you?”

“Only two.” She pauses. “It’s cyborgs again, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Augmented soldiers in a cordon around the entrance. Human, this time, but the tech looks a lot like what you described from the underwater facility.”

“How many?”

Silence for a moment, then- “Four? No. Six, and one in heavier armor.”

She sighs.

“Too many?”

“I’ll manage. Where’s Jakarro?”

“Close,” Theron says. “But loud. You get backup or surprise, not both.”

That’s an easy choice. “Surprise, always. Keep him clear.” He knows the protocols, she hopes, or they’re all in trouble. “Requesting radio silence.”

“Copy that. Await your all-clear.” The channel clicks off. Not entirely useless, then. Good.

The heads-up did help. She gives Raina the second grenade and they split off a hundred meters out, the range on their synchronized generators just enough to let them flank the cordon from each side of the wide staircase; the grenades drop all the soldiers, their augmentations overloaded and sparking, leaving just the commander- who, of fucking course, has a rocket pack and another six cyborgs-

No. Another dozen cyborgs, in two separate waves.

Still, she manages. She always manages, though there’s a long scorch mark across her chest where she got too close to the commander’s downdraft by the time they’re done and Raina’s got a graze along her left thigh that’s left her limping. As the other woman presses a kolto autoinjector against her leg, the needle triggering with a soft hiss, her earpiece chimes, then chimes again.

“I thought I called silence, Theron.” Now that they’ve a moment to rest her left shoulder’s hurting, too, a dull wrenching ache, and she rolls it backward and forward. “And it was eighteen Void-damned cyborgs, not six, so you’d better have good news for me or I am really going to be very cross.”

“I’m afraid it’s more bad news, Cipher.” Lana sounds strange, distracted, her words slurring together. (I remember that. I had a terrible headache, Lana says. I was hearing Revan even then, but I didn’t know it… it was just a roar. Like sticking your head in a turbine.) “Arkous knows you’re coming, and they’ve got a shuttle on the roof. You may have to engage after all- we can’t afford to let them escape again.”

“You’re on your way, I hope.”

“Yes, but-”

She flicks the tip of the transmitter with her fingernail and gets twin yelps in reply, which serves them right because they’re going to get her killed and she is not going to die here, not today. “Let me guess- but you’re not sure you can get here in time.”

“No. We can get there, but Darok just fired up the turrets and I can’t get into that part of the security grid remotely. Going to need a distraction to be able to land near the tower.” Theron’s still trying to slice in, probably, given the amount of clicking in the background.

“How lethal of a distraction?”

“The goal is still live capture, if at all possible,” Lana says, her voice a little clearer.

She grumbles under her breath. She can hear Jakarro across the courtyard, so it’ll be three on two (the droid doesn’t count); those still aren’t ideal odds, though if she can foist Darth Arkous off on the Wookiee… well. It’s something. “Oh, all right. Shall I do it without armor, too? It’ll be an extra challenge, if you’re going to handicap me anyway.”

That earns an unamused huff from Lana, and, over the continued terminal noise, a muttered I’ve got cameras on top of the tower, right?

“You’re still transmitting, Theron. Moving to intercept.”

She imagines him blushing as she and Raina and now Jakarro, too, bounding up the steps four at a time behind them, fight their way through the entrance to the main temple, through the halls and up the turbolift to the shuttle platform.

In the end it didn’t matter.

Darok and Arkous were never going to surrender, never going to let themselves be taken alive, and she kicks herself for not suspecting the Revanite connection sooner; it explains so easily how they’d ended up here, following in the footsteps of a dead fool, though the Revanites had deeper roots than she’d imagined. She thought they’d stomped out the last of that heresy years ago, when she’d exposed the leader of their cell on Dromund Kaas- but she’d never followed that through, distracted as she was by the destruction of Jadus’ Dominator. Clearly, at least a few of the rats had dodged the trap.

She’d left her transmitter wide open while they’d fought, and as Jakarro gives Darok’s body one last ferocious kick she slumps against the rooftop console to nurse her bruised ribs and get the perimeter guns powered down. Opening the holoterminal and a slicing channel, she catches her breath as Theron and Lana flicker into view, side by side.

“You heard all that, I hope?”

“Heard and felt- the colonel is dead, too? I sensed Darth Arkous’ passing.” Her expression dour, Lana shakes her head. “It’s a shame they wouldn’t say any more.”

Theron’s shifting from foot to foot, fidgeting with his datapad. “I’m pulling data now, but there’s not much here. Damn it, we may never figure out what they were really up to. They were building an army for someone, but-”

“We’ll- oh-” Lana flinches, eyes scrunching shut as her face contorts in pain, and she staggers for a moment. “Something’s coming.”

(And to think I used to envy you that mind-reading thing, she says, nudging Lana teasingly. It seemed so useful.

It is, sometimes. But it’s hard to control. One ends up- she nudges her back, two fingers prodding at the side of her neck- seeing things one wishes one hadn’t.)

The ship’s already darkening the sky when she looks up, the figure projecting from it nearly half again the height of the tower and looming high overhead like something out of a nightmare, all cape and hood and mask and-

Raina ducks out of sight; Lana’s staring, eyes wide, up at the figure, and Theron’s gone pale and quiet and his lips move, silent- she told me he wasn’t dead, she knew-

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” She rests her hands on her hips, scowling upward in the general direction of its face, if it can see her at all. “Revan. I’m pretty sure I killed you.”

***

I don’t remember Theron saying that. Lana turns her head, eyebrow a perfect arching question mark. Who did he mean, she?

She shrugs. I assume he meant his mother… I’m not sure, actually. But you remember the rest of what happened after that, don’t you?

Lana nods. We should have waited for you on the beach, but Revan’s flagship was firing on us, too. Splitting up seemed the safest option. Then by the time I made it back to Vaiken, the death warrant was already active. Arkous’ failsafe must have kicked in the moment he died, and the word of a Darth, a Dark Council member, even posthumous, against mine- She shrugs. I ran, and hoped you’d get my message.

And Theron did the same, and Jakarro. I only slipped the net by virtue of not technically actually existing, I think- it wouldn’t work now, not with the old Minister gone, but he used to wipe my dossier once a month. It made it rather difficult to pin me down.

Lana grins at that. A trick I wished I could have replicated, but no such luck. So it was quite a relief, really, when you showed up on Manaan again, though I’m not sure Theron felt quite the same.

He said he was glad to see me. The pillow beneath her head’s gone flat; she fluffs it carefully, and settles back down. Although asking for a mutual debriefing may have been pushing it just a little too far.

(Stuttering out a denial, he’d blushed so hard his scalp turned pink. Oh, Force, he was cute when he blushed.)

***

Up next: Best-Laid Plans, in which the rest of what was supposed to happen in this chapter actually happens (they got chatty and we’ve got a schedule to stick to, here), we spend New Year’s Eve on Port Nowhere, and a rescue on Rishi brings two truths to light.

#inyri writes #equivalent exchange #swtor fanfiction #imperial agent/theron shan #imperial agent #cipher nine #theron shan

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